December 2012 End Of The Month/End Of The Year Report!

| | | Ending the year on a very high note!

This month at W.L. Swarts Reviews The Universe, we broke a couple of records and had some wonderful growth! There was a new addition to the Top Ten Of All Time, (for a long time, it looked like Parental Guidance was going to make it there, too!) and December became the blog's most trafficked month by a couple thousand hits! Once again, big movie releases were what intrigued our readers most! This month, we put special emphasis on music reviews and we appreciate all of the great feedback on them! Thanks for all the "likes" for those posts!

December also saw us picking up another subscriber, thanks for joining us! We are always trying to get people to become regular readers and subscribe, so if you enjoy what you're reading, please subscribe by clicking on the right side of the blog to get updates with each posting. As well, if you read a review that really affects you, be sure to "share" it! PLEASE share a link to the blog, not the content of the article; this keeps people coming to the site and, hopefully, liking what they find once they are here! We're really looking to grow our readership, so sharing and subscribing to the blog is an important way you can help! If you’re subscribing, please tell your friends about the blog!

In December, we were able to keep the Index Pages up and updated almost the entire month, keeping it a very dynamic website. The primary Index Page, which is now updated daily, lets you know what the featured review is and has an up-to-the-day tally of how many reviews have been reviewed in each category! Check it out!

If you enjoy the reviews, please consider clicking on the links in the reviews and purchasing items. We really appreciate all the purchases made through the blog during this holiday season. Thank you so much! By purchasing items through the links on the blog, you sponsor my ability to continue reviewing. Thank you so much for that support!

At the end of December, I have reviewed the following:
420 - Book Reviews
with specialized index pages for:
Fiction
Star Trek Books
Nonfiction
Graphic Novels
Magazines
704 - Music (Album and Singles) Reviews
with specialized index pages for:
Music Reviews By Rating (Best To Worst)
Music Reviews In Alphabetical Order
2064 - Movie and Television Reviews
with specialized index pages for:
Movies By Rating (Best Movie to Worst)
Movies In Alphabetical Order
Best Picture Oscar Winner Film Reviews
Television Reviews
The Star Trek Review Index Page (All Star Trek Reviews In Order)!
The Star Trek Review Index Page (All Star Trek Reviews From The Best Of The Franchise To The Worst!)!
176 - Trading and Gaming Card Reviews
Gaming Cards Reviews
Star Trek Gaming Cards Reviews
Star Wars Gaming Cards Reviews
The Lord Of The Rings Trading Card Game Reviews
Other Gaming Cards Reviews
Trading Cards Reviews
609 - Toy and Christmas Ornament Reviews
with specialized pages for:
Ornament Reviews
Star Trek Toys
Star Wars Toys
Lord Of The Rings Toys
Buffy The Vampire Slayer/Angel Toys
Comic Book, Movie, Television Toys
Plush and Other Toys
609 - Food, Drink, And Restaurant Reviews
with specialized index pages for:
Drinks
Candy
Cereal
Cheese and Meats
Ice Cream
Other Food
153 - Pet Product Reviews
Cat Product Reviews
Dog Product Reviews
Rabbit Product Reviews
106 - Travel Reviews
Destinations Reviews
Hotels Reviews
131 - Health And Beauty Product Reviews
137 - Home, Garden, Appliance and Tool Reviews
84 - Electronics, Computers, Computer Games and Software Reviews
22 - Other Product Reviews

The Featured Review Of The Month for December is: La Senorita Restaurant! For those interested in such things, the first review of 2012 on the blog was: Justice League Classic Icons Wonder Woman Action Figure!
and the final review of the year was: The Flash Archives Volume 1!
Check them out!

The month of December saw some serious staying power of some prior popular reviews as well as the predictable popularity of four big new theatrical releases. For December, the Top Ten Reviews of the month were:
10. The Top Ten Episodes Of Frasier
9. Angry Birds Star Wars
8. Like Crazy
7. Brita Water Filter 42629 Slim Pitcher
6. The Dark Knight Trilogy
5. 2012 Merida From Brave Hallmark Ornament
4. Les Miserables
3. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
2. Parental Guidance
1. Warm Bodies

I pride myself on being an exceptionally fair reviewer, but one who is very discriminating. I believe that most reviewers are far too biased toward both what is current and toward unduly praising things. I tend to believe most things actually are average and they ought to follows something around a Bell Curve. Mine is a little lopsided, but not as lopsided as most reviewers I know (who would probably have peak numbers between ten and seven!

For my reviews, the current count is:
10s - 266 reviews
9s - 376 reviews
8s - 668 reviews
7s - 736 reviews
6s - 660 reviews
5s - 867 reviews
4s - 610 reviews
3s - 500 reviews
2s - 216 reviews
1s - 146 reviews
0s - 75 reviews
No rating - 31 articles/postings

As we finish the year, it is worth noting that only TWO of the reviews still in the Top Ten Of All Time (I know I miss my Anne Hathaway For Wonder Woman article being there!). There was movement in this final month of the year, and at the end of December, the most popular reviews/articles I have written are:
10. Breaking Dawn, Part 1
9. Snow White And The Huntsman
8. Warm Bodies
7. The Amazing Spider-Man!
6. Cadbury Screme Eggs
5. The Avengers
4. The Hunger Games
3. Star Trek: Machinations Of Doomsday
2. Won't Back Down
1. Prometheus

Thank you again, so much, for reading! Please share links to the blog with friends and spread the word! HAPPY NEW YEAR!

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Ending My Flash Year On A Downbeat With Dated Flash Vignettes: The Flash Archives Volume 1

The Good: Decent historical document, Includes covers, Includes introductions of some important villains
The Bad: Comic strip art/coloring, Exceptionally repetitive plots, No character development, Not a solid narrative
The Basics: The Flash Archives Volume 1 is a poor anthology that nevertheless serves to collect some of the early stories of Barry Allen as the Flash.


As my Flash Year comes to an end, I have absolutely no problem with admitting that I enjoyed the Wally West era of The Flash far more than the Barry Allen epoch. Barry Allen might have been the establishing version of The Flash, but his role in the Silver Age of comics helps to illustrate just how dated those books are, at least as they are represented in The Flash Archives Volume 1.

The Flash Archives Volume 1 is a decent historical document, but it is by no means an essential one. Presenting the earliest adventures of Barry Allen as The Flash from Showcase Comics and the rebirth of The Flash, The Flash Archives Volume 1 is a series of repetitive vignettes that establish Barry Allen as the new (second) incarnation of The Flash and bores the pants off the readers. Save the origin story of Barry Allen as the Flash (which is reprinted ad nauseum in other volumes) and the introduction of the essential Flash villains Captain Cold, Gorilla Grodd, and Mirror Master (which are all part of a more discriminating anthology that showcases the origins of every major villain in the Flash Rogues gallery), The Flash Archives Volume 1 is anything but essential for serious readers.

Instead, The Flash Archives Volume 1 illustrates (pun intended) the lack of sophistication of the comic books of the mid to late 1950s. Without building upon each adventure, each chapter is a vignette story that has the Flash encountering a new villain that (usually) keeps him from being on time to his dates with Iris Allen. In some ways, The Flash Archives Volume 1 characterizes The Flash as a repetitive epic, without a grand scale or the character ever learning anything to progress beyond his original state. It is also notable that the Flash in The Flash Archives Volume 1 is characterized as the sole crimefighter in the world. He has no interaction with other super heroes and does not reference other superheroes or villains. As a matter of basic continuity, it seems odd, for example, when Barry Allen creates a police scanner radio watch that allows him to tap into police activity in Paris, Egypt, and Tibet, that the device never picks up a call from Gotham City.

The average story in The Flash Archives Volume 1 goes like this: Barry Allen leaves his day job as a police forensic scientist in Central City to visit Iris West for a date. En route, or shortly after meeting his reporter girlfriend, a crime is committed in the vicinity or that Barry learns about elsewhere. After a panel of trying to figure out how he can ditch Iris without her figuring out that Barry is the Flash, Barry Allen opens his ring, which allows his Flash costume to expand to normal size, and then he runs off to thwart the villain. After successfully thwarting the villain, the Flash returns to Central City, reverts to his mundane Barry Allen persona, and Iris calls him slow.

The Flash Archives Volume 1 is really that repetitive, predictable, and (frankly) dull. Outside the reappearance of Gorilla Grodd, there is no growth, no reference to past adventures in the book. As a result, The Flash Archives Volume 1 plods along as a series of mishaps that pit the Flash against Turtle Man, Mazdan, a criminal magician syndicate, Captain Cold, a series of villains and mishaps that take him around the world in 80 minutes, Mr. Element, Aliens from the Fourth Dimension, Dr. Alchemy, Katmos, Mirror Master, Gorilla Grodd, Pied Piper, Grodd again, An alien speedster, An alien thief and Grodd yet again.

Barry Allen does not grow, develop, or truly learn from his conflicts; he just experiences new conflicts. One after another, with no sense of growth Barry Allen has these formulaic conflicts, which makes The Flash Archives Volume 1 more tiresome than pleasurable to read.

The artwork in The Flash Archives Volume 1 is very much like a comic strip, as opposed to a comic book. There is almost no sense of movement within or between panels, so the book is much like looking at a series of snapshots to tell the stories, instead of a film.

Even for fans or scholars of The Flash, it is hard to get excited about The Flash Archives Volume 1.

For other Flash graphic novels, please be sure to visit my reviews of:
The Flash Vs. The Rogues
The Trial Of The Flash
Born To Run
The Return Of Barry Allen
Terminal Velocity
Dead Heat
Race Against Time
Emergency Stop
The Human Race
Wonderland
Blood Will Run
Rogues
Crossfire
Blitz
Ignition
The Secret Of Barry Allen
Rogue War
Full Throttle
Lightning In A Bottle
Flash: Rebirth
The Dastardly Death Of The Rogues
The Road To Flashpoint
The Life Story Of The Flash

2.5/10

For other graphic novel reviews, please visit my Graphic Novel Review Index Page for an organized listing of all the graphic novel reviews I have written!

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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What If Death Was One Of Us? “Ashes To Ashes” Brings The Dead To Star Trek: Voyager!

The Good: Good acting, Interesting character development, Special effects, Basic plot
The Bad: Many of the details surrounding the plot and character elements in the episode.
The Basics: “Ashes To Ashes” is Star Trek: Voyager’s less-creepy Walking Dead episode that is smart and bold, until one looks closely at it.


As I go through the end of Star Trek: Voyager and find episodes that I either did not see or did not remember, I keep looking for episodes that are hidden gems. “Ashes To Ashes” might be the most compelling argument for an episode that was overlooked for one of the better ones of the series. It is, also, an unfortunate example of yet another episode of Star Trek: Voyager that has a great concept, but is sadly deficient on the details when one looks closely at it. “Ashes To Ashes,” in the larger context of Star Trek: Voyager makes less sense and resonates less than it otherwise should have.

Even so, the basic concept of the a-plot is one of the most original Star Trek: Voyager episodes – the closest in the franchise I could find for comparison was the brilliant “Hard Time” (reviewed here!) from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. The b-plot threatens to overwhelm the force of the episode in the middle while the a-plot makes a transition between the original concept and the new direction it has to take in order to flesh out the full episode. When the a-plot reasserts itself as the primary focus of the episode, “Ashes To Ashes” follows the same usual “orphan” plot of all Star Trek episodes where the plot resolves with the easiest possible solution that ensures the viewer will never see the orphaned character again. Star Trek: Voyager’s entry into the “orphan” plot is actually the best of the bunch.

An alien woman in a mysterious shuttle works to contact Voyager. She gets through to Mezoti, who is not tall enough to transfer the message to Captain Janeway. She reveals herself to be Ensign Lyndsay Ballard, who died three years prior. Catching up with Voyager, the Doctor scans Ballard and discovers that her DNA has been altered by the Kobali, an alien race Voyager never directly encountered. Ballard explains that her dead body was found by the Kobali, who reanimated her corpse as their form of procreation.

While Seven Of Nine reluctantly adapts to parenting the four ex-Borg orphans, she finds the challenge of promoting their individuality more than she truly wants. Mezoti, especially, begins to push the borders of Seven’s rules. As Ballard struggles with being alive but having Kobali memories, despite increasing alterations that make her appear human, Voyager is pursued by her Kobali father, Q’ret. Q’ret wants his daughter, Jetlaya (Ballard as a Kobali), back and Ballard is torn between her burgeoning relationship with Harry Kim and the pull to return to her new family.

“Ashes To Ashes” is a surprisingly compelling episode and one of the best Harry Kim romance stories in the entire series. Instead of pointless defiance (“The Disease”), the usual pursuit of the unattainable, or just whiny, Harry Kim is characterized in “Ashes To Ashes” as harboring long-held feelings for Ballard and actor Garret Wang portrays that exceptionally well. While the episode completely neglects the whole idea that Harry Kim was in a long-term stable relationship at the outset of the series, as seen in “Non Sequitur” (reviewed here!), and Lyndsay Ballard is unique to this episode.

The main positive continuity element of “Ashes To Ashes” is the inclusion of “Collective” (reviewed here!). Unfortunately, the inclusion of the four ex-Borg children creates a serious character nightmare the moment one steps back and objectively looks at the episode. In fact, writer Robert Doherty seems to have absolutely no understanding or appreciation of the larger story of Star Trek: Voyager or the Voyager crew.

First, on the Borg children front, saddling Seven Of Nine with the Borg children is an easy response to the new characters, but makes no real sense. Seven Of Nine explicitly stated in “Collective” and “Ashes To Ashes” that she did not want to be responsible for them. Instead of promoting any sort of realistic interpretation of the Voyager crew after five and a half years lost in space, the producers stuck Seven Of Nine with the children. Far more interesting and realistic would have been that members of the crew fought amongst themselves to get custody of various children. Instead of Seven Of Nine being forced to care for children that she clearly did not want responsibility over (and whom Janeway cannot actually assert authority or appeal to her humanity or StarFleet training), a far more interesting direction might have been Neelix arguing with Ensign Wildman for custody of the twins while Paris and Torres try to get Mezoti as practice for when they have a child of their own. Right there, ideas that portray realistic character development without making an easy way out that just uses Seven Of Nine yet again and in a way that makes no real sense for her.

In a similar way, “Ashes To Ashes” would have been far more compelling if the audience or the characters had had an attachment to Lyndsay Ballard prior to the episode. An especially compelling twist would have been if the character resurrected was the dead woman from “Latent Image” (reviewed here!). In addition to providing a conflict for Harry Kim, it would have given the Doctor a far more compelling arc in the episode.

“Ashes To Ashes” also makes no explanation for how the Kobali could catch up with Voyager. If they possessed incredible technology that allowed the ship to catch up, despite the jumps Voyager has made in the years since leaving Hirogen space (Ballard was killed by a Hirogen trap), that there is no attempt to alter Voyager or barter for the technology seems incredibly sloppy.

All of those things that could have been done better in the episode pale in comparison to what was done right. Harry Kim complaining that he has never been invited to dinner in the Captain’s quarters is a great detail and Ballard using her moments with Janeway to try to ask why she was sent to her death is especially clever. Janeway acting casual is wonderful, though her replicator burning (not, as she says, “liquefying” her roast) makes no sense. As Ballard asks about the assignment that led to her death, it is a powerful and compelling moment.

Kim Rhodes plays Ensign Ballard exceptionally well and she and Garrett Wang have excellent on-screen chemistry. Wang has great body language in his performance in “Ashes To Ashes,” making this one of Kim’s best episodes from the acting front.

Easily one of the most compelling episodes in the Star Trek franchise to explore death, “Ashes To Ashes” is character-focused enough to make one ignore the many detail-related issues with it. Philosophically smart and wisely character-centered, “Ashes To Ashes” is one of the later-season gems of Star Trek: Voyager.

[Knowing that VHS is essentially a dead medium, it's worth looking into Star Trek: Voyager - The Complete Sixth Season on DVD, which is also a better economical choice than buying the VHS. Read my review of the penultimate season here!
Thanks!]

8.5/10

For other Star Trek episode and movie reviews, please visit my Star Trek Review Index Page!

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Decipher Nails The Star Trek Second Edition CCG With The Perfect Release: "Necessary Evil!"

The Good: Great cards throughout, Good and smart concept, Easy playability, Great collectibility, Rarity
The Bad: Rarity, Minutiae of foil reprints
The Basics: Decipher creates the ultimate Star Trek CCG with a collection of rares that allow players to take more risks, at higher costs!


As anyone who follows my reviews on the Star Trek gaming cards might note, there are few expansions that manage to get graded above average in my book and to date I believe there has not been one that I have rated as a perfect release. Today that changes as I finally make it to "Necessary Evil," a Star Trek Second Edition expansion whose entire concept is that riskier, more gutsy plays may be made in the game, with a higher price to the players. This concept is designed for players, reaffirming the concept that the riskier the road, the greater the profit, but it works amazingly well for collectors as this concept set pays off there between the rarity of the release and the great mix of characters and images that are unique to this set.

Basics/Set Composition

"Necessary Evil" is the fourth set of Star Trek Second Edition gaming cards for the Star Trek CCG. It is a 198 card set comprised of sixty common, sixty uncommon and sixty rare cards, as well as eighteen foil reprint cards of some of the most popular and powerful cards in the set. This set is not bound together by the addition of any new affiliations or sub-affiliations or even game mechanics. The whole idea in this set is that the characters represented have other sides to them that are often less desirable and to access those elements which might play well for players playing certain affiliations the player needs to risk a lot in terms of points and/or cards.

The one hundred eighty unique cards (the foils are straightforward reprints) that make up the set include: 31 Dilemma (Obstacles in the Star Trek universe players play to thwart their opponents, like a Biochemical Hyperacceleration or a Talosian Trial), 3 Equipment (cards representing mass produced objects in the Star Trek universe, like an Emergency Transport Unit or the Sword Of Kahless), 50 Event (cards representing longer-standing obstacles or changes that persist throughout multiple turns, like brainwashing a character into The Perfect Tool to assassinate other characters or resurrecting a dead comrade At What Cost?), 14 Interrupt (cards representing sudden shifts of fate, like capturing a character for brainwashing or absorbing the Knowledge And Experience of a character to strengthen a Borg hand against adversaries), 79 Personnel (12 Bajoran, 5 Borg, 9 Cardassian, 8 Dominion, 18 Federation, 5 Klingon, 9 Non-Aligned, 13 Romulan affiliation characters), and 3 Ship cards (one each Bajoran, Federation, and Klingon). Usually, the more personnel and ship cards a set has, the better it fares, but in this case, it is well-represented in Events that have great images that sell it to even non-players.

Playability

"Necessary Evil" is easy to learn for anyone who has played the Star Trek Second Edition CCG from "Premiere" (reviewed here!). Basically, this is a card game that is somewhere between a card game, a board game and a role playing game. "Necessary Evil" is not terribly complex, save that in order to play powerful cards, players need to make a tradeoff with cards of high point values or other characters that they are playing. As a result, "Necessary Evil" is remarkably fun and the game can be turned drastically on many of the cards in this set, especially some of the more powerful rares.

There is no rulebook that accompanies this booster-pack only set, so to learn the game one cannot start with this set. It is, however, the best set for players looking to shake off the monotony of the otherwise straightforward game. This one is all about taking risks.

Rule Changes

There are no changes to rules with this set. There are no new card types, affiliations or sub-affiliations introduced in "Necessary Evil." Instead, this continues the game as it was with only the addition of cards that cost more to use.

Highlights

This is a set of cards made almost entirely out of highlights! The sixty rare cards are each gems, with an amazing variety to sustain interest in them. In addition to Romulan Affiliation versions of the Klingon Duras Sisters (as well as Klingon versions of the same!), there are Klingon Affiliation versions of Jadzia Dax and William Riker! And it might seem strange that in a collection of cards that includes rogue Borg versions of Data, Lore and Crosis in the Non-Aligned Personnel and Cardassian versions of Kira and Odo that the highlights would come down to three cards, one of which is not even a Personnel!

Fans of this set seem to be obsessed with the rare Event "At What Cost?" so it is certainly worth mentioning as a highlight to this set! "At What Cost?" allows a player to surrender a slew of cards or points to bring a Personnel card out of their lost pile. Based on resurrecting Spock in Star Trek III, this card allows a player to return as prized commander or needed card to play, which makes it invaluable to players.

Collectors, though, - as well as some players - are likely to fawn over Guinan or Jake Sisko. Guinan, chronically underrepresented in trading and gaming cards, appears here as a rare that is powerful and has some good abilities when she comes into play. Similarly, Jake Sisko, Reporter Behind The Lines, represents the only version of Jake in the game as played by Cirroc Lofton (the prior version was of Tony Todd's elderly version from "The Visitor"). Jake becomes useful for subterfuge and exposing undercover players and he's surprisingly handy. Moreover, the card has a good likeness for collectors.

Collectibility

"Necessary Evil" is perhaps the ultimate booster pack release as it was underprinted and underreleased. Finding a box of these cards is virtually impossible. Finding rares is difficult enough and more often than not, they start at a higher price ($3.00 range) than most other expansion's rares (usually starting at the $2.00 range). Moreover, this set has a higher number of higher value ($5.00 range) rares that have never come down in price, cards like the Cardassian Affiliation Odo as well as the Odo Founder. Even Leeta, who is in several releases, has a higher valued card in this set!

Because "Necessary Evil" was never reprinted or rereleased in any other form ("Reflections 2.0" packs have the occasional single from "Necessary Evil" in them, but there is usually only one per pack and they are not at all consistently placed in packs of that product!) this remains one of the hardest to find products in the Star Trek Second Edition CCG release. They are rare and highly desired.

The only real gripe might be with the foil cards. There are eighteen foil reprint cards, which simply take eighteen of the best rares (At What Cost?, Dukat as Anjohl Tennan, and Jadzia Dax, Problem Solver, for example) and reprint them. One might have wished the foil cards to be unique rares only available in the foiled versions, but in retrospect that might have made this set even more impossible to complete for everyone!

Overview

Decipher, Inc, the manufacturer of Star Trek CCGs did right by everyone with this set. Players found the game reinvigorated, collectors found something challenging - but not impossible - to complete and investors found a product rare enough that it has only appreciated as time goes on. It's hard to ask for more. This might well be the peak of this product!

This set was released after "Call To Arms" (reviewed here!) but prior to "Fractured Time" (review pending!).

This complicated and interesting set culls images primarily from
Star Trek: The Next Generation
and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Most notably
"Necessary Evil"
"Second Skin"
"Redemption, Part II"
and "Decent, Part II"

This is a set of gaming cards I sell in my online store! Check out my current inventory here!

9/10

For other Star Trek gaming card reviews, please visit my Star Trek CCG Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2012, 2008 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Worth Going Back For - Early Melissa Etheridge

The Good: Wonderful lyrics, Some good music, Moments of voice
The Bad: Often a simple sound, SHORT!
The Basics: With wonderful poetics and a distinct, smoky voice, Melissa Etheridge's debut remains a worthwhile listening experience.


After Melissa Etheridge had released a bunch of singles from Yes I Am, radio stations began to play Like The Way I Do, from her debut album, as a new single before the release of Your Little Secret. In this way, she kept herself on the charts and boosted sales of her old debut while preparing her new album. It was a clever strategy. I still respect the concept, so when I was given the opportunity to pick up Melissa Etheridge (her debut album), I leapt on the disc.

Melissa Etheridge, is a ten-track disc that introduced the world to Melissa Etheridge, musical artist. I have a big thing about eponymous albums, but Melissa Etheridge seems to live up well to the autobiographical nature of an eponymous album given what little I know about Etheridge. The music on the album is angsty, but it rocks and it reeks throughout of a person who has been betrayed by others. Conceptually, it might be depressing, but if this is the persona Etheridge wishes to create or portray - in naming a c.d. her own name - she does it quite well.

For those who are unfamiliar with Melissa Etheridge - I recently encountered an 18 year-old young woman who had absolutely no idea who Etheridge was! -, she is a rock and roll singer-songwriter following in the tradition of Janis Joplin, Grace Slick, and - with the storytelling way many of her songs take - Joan Baez. She sings with unabashed sexuality ("I Want You" is very direct at the end of the album), wrenching loss ("Bring Me Some Water") and with the power of jealousy ("Similar Features"). And yet, she creates something completely enjoyable to listen to.

Despite having only ten tracks, Melissa Etheridge covers a wide variety of subjects with a solid rock sound as the common thread. The musical sound - strong guitars and drums - dominate and define the album and in some way limit it. The songs have diverse tempos, but sound similar enough to one another that any track on the album is easily recognizable as coming from Melissa Etheridge. Having listened to a few of her albums now - I own two - the development of Etheridge as an artist makes me wonder if one heard all her songs if one would be able to put together these ten songs as belonging to the same album. It's not necessarily a detraction that they all sound like they are from the same level of development - this is, after all, a debut. The tracks, however, lack the production or complicated experimentalism that come out on later albums, like Breakdown.

Some debut albums are best forgotten, but Melissa Etheridge is one worth going back to and enjoying. The most compelling argument for picking up Melissa Etheridge is that even from the beginning Etheridge was a true artist. Etheridge wrote all ten songs, sings them, and plays guitar on the tracks. As well, she is the album's co-producer and arranger, meaning that she was integral on every step of this album, which is appropriate given the autobiographical title.

And she does it well. It's easy to see why so many people went backwards with Etheridge when - in 1995 - they heard on the radio, "Is it so hard to satisfy your senses / You found out to love me you have to climb some fences / Scratching and crawling along the floor to touch you / And just when it feels right you say you found someone to hold you / Does she like I do . . ." (“Like The Way I Do”). Etheridge is poetic and dark and she expresses anxieties in such a way that still manages to rock. That is no small feat.

Etheridge's voice is a smoky, lower-register range that is very distinctive, like Grace Slick, of Jefferson Starship. In fact, Etheridge's vocals come closest to Slick's performance of "Somebody To Love" in terms of vocal force (if not precise range). Hearing Etheridge on "Like The Way I Do" makes one wish she would cover "Somebody To Love."

Melissa Etheridge is certainly a great album for anyone who likes rock and roll and it is a strong debut, limited only by duration and development. It foreshadows a positive career of an exceptionally talented singer-songwriter and is great for anyone who wants moody lyrics without - necessarily - depressing melodies. C'Mon, anyone who can make a song with a rock-dance beat about jealousy is worth your attention!

The best track is either "Like The Way I Do" or the slow and sad "Precious Pain," which is the distinctly different poetic presentation on Melissa Etheridge. Ironically, one of Etheridge's first tracks released as a single, "Chrome Plated Heart" stands out as the weakest track.

For other works by Melissa Etheridge, please be sure to check out my reviews of:
Brave And Crazy
Nowhere To Go (single)
Breakdown
The Road Less Traveled: The Best Of Melissa Etheridge
A New Thought For Christmas
Fearless Love

6.5/10

For other music reviews, please visit my Music Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2012, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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A Surprising Bit Of Healthy Yuck: Breyers CarbSmart Vanilla Ice Cream Is Just Gross!

The Good: Very nutritious, Inexpensive
The Bad: Irksome aftertaste
The Basics: Breyers CarbSmart Vanilla Ice Cream might be healthy, but it is not the type of health food one wants to live very long to have to eat all the time!


My wife tried the Atkin’s diet again recently. Determined to reduce her carbs, she picked up the Breyers CarbSmart Vanilla ice cream because it only had 13 grams of carbs. I think that it was this ice cream that got her to break her diet. It is that unlikable an ice cream.

Breyers’s CarbSmart Vanilla Ice Cream is an incredibly simple ice cream with no additives. It is clearly a diet food and the CarbSmart Vanilla flavor is subjugated to the taste of the Splenda in this.

Basics

Breyers ice cream comes in a typical half gallon container. The CarbSmart Vanilla Ice Cream is a smooth, creamy ice cream: the basic ice cream unadorned or mixes with any other additives. At (locally) $5.99 a half gallon, the Breyers ice cream is an affordable, mid-range ice cream. This is a poor ice cream that prioritizes health benefits over authenticity of flavor.

Ease Of Preparation

Breyers CarbSmart Vanilla Ice Cream is a very basic ice cream. As an ice cream, preparation is ridiculously simple: one need only open the top of the container, scoop out a half cup and consume! There is no trick to preparing or eating the CarbSmart Vanilla Ice Cream.

Taste

The CarbSmart Vanilla Ice Cream smells just like vanilla bean. In fact, this smells incredibly inviting and anyone who loves vanilla is likely to want to taste this based on its aroma.

Unfortunately, the Breyers CarbSmart Vanilla ice cream is sweet, dry, and . . . very dry. This ice cream has a slight bitter/dry flavor that those who might be familiar with fake sweeteners, like Splenda will recognize instantly. The hint of vanilla bean flavor fades ridiculously fast in favor of the somewhat dry, bitter Splenda aftertaste. On its own, this ice cream ends up tasting almost nothing like vanilla and it has a strong aftertaste that makes it unpleasant. That aftertaste does not fade and it leaves the mouth very dry.

Nutrition

The Breyers CarbSmart Vanilla Ice Cream is a very light, smooth, ice cream with no additives. The half gallon represents twelve half-cup servings. In the half-cup serving, there are 90 calories, 50 of which are from fat. The six grams of fat represent 9% of the RDA of fat, with 18% of one’s RDA of saturated fat coming in the 3.5 grams of saturated fat in this ice cream. One serving has 20 mg of cholesterol (that’s 7% of the RDA!) and 45 mg of Sodium (2% RDA). The only other real nutrient is two grams of protein, though there is also 6% of the RDA of Calcium and 4% of the RDA of Vitamin A in the CarbSmart Vanilla Ice Cream.

Breyers has decent ingredients, though. Made primarily of Milk, skim milk, and cream, CarbSmart Vanilla is a decent ice cream! There is nothing unpronounceable in the ingredients list.

Storage/Clean-Up

Breyers ice cream is both a frozen and a dairy product, so it is pretty obvious that it must be kept frozen in order to remain viable. Kept frozen it remains fresh for months (my half gallon had an expiration date of January 28, 2014).

The CarbSmart Vanilla ice cream is very light, opaque white, and will certainly stain some clothing, at the very least. When the ice cream melts and gets onto fabrics, it will require one to wash it right out. On nonporous surfaces, the ice cream wipes off exceptionally easily.

Overall

Breyers CarbSmart Vanilla ice cream is a poor ice cream that might be healthy, but is such an off flavor of vanilla that one will not want to eat it.

For other Breyers frozen dairy desserts, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Blasts! Oreo Cookies & Cream Mint
Blasts! Heath Bar
Blasts! Mrs. Fields Mint Fudge Brownie
Blasts! S'mores ice cream
Blasts Klondike Krunch ice cream
Blasts! Chips Ahoy! ice cream
Smooth & Dreamy Creamy Vanilla

3/10

For other food reviews, please visit my Food Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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The Horrors Of Boredom: Cujo Is More Boring Than Scary!

The Good: ?, Basic concept?
The Bad: Not scary, Terrible acting, Derivative characters, Predictable plot
The Basics: A rabid dog torments a family as they wait for it to rip them apart in a boring ‘80’s horror film.


I’m always astonished when I discover a film in my wife’s personal collection that is just terrible. And yet, giving the film Cujo (which came with her), I am forced to accept that she and I have vastly different tastes in films sometimes. Actually, when we watched it, she was cringing quite a bit and I have the feeling she felt no small amount of embarrassment having kept the DVD in her permanent library for as long as she did. My wife loves dogs and Cujo was the only horror movie she liked growing up.

On its own, Cujo might not be bad, outside its terrible 1980’s cheesetastic appearance now. It is, however, entirely derivative and is pretty lousy for anyone who has read the book Jaws (which contained some romantic subplots that did not make it into the cinematic rendition). Actually, I blame a lot in Cujo (in fact, its making it to the screen) on Jaws (reviewed here!). Stephen King and screenwriters Don Carlos Dunaway and Lauren Currier are clearly fans of Peter Benchley’s work and one has to suspect that the box-office success of Jaws encouraged studios to make Cujo. It is worth noting that I have not read Stephen King’s novel by the same name, so this is a pure review of the film Cujo.

The Saint Bernard, Cujo, chases a rabbit into a hole. There, he unearths a flock of bats, one of whom is rabid. Cujo is bitten on the nose by the rabid bat and begins to isolate himself. Elsewhere in town, the Trentons are struggling to keep their marriage together. Tad, afraid of the dark, relies upon his parents Vic and Donna to keep him from fear. With their cars breaking down, Vic takes the advice of a mailman and takes his car out to Camber on the edge of town. There, the Trentons meet Cujo and are led to believe they have nothing to fear from him.

After a recall of the cereal for which Vic created the advertising campaign, Vic realizes Donna is having an affair on him. Forced to focus on his work, Vic abandons Donna and Tad to deal with cereal manufacturer. While Vic is away, Donna and Tad go to pick up the car from Camber’s farm. There, they run into Cujo, who is demented by rabies and has already killed two people. Cujo terrifies Donna and Tad over the course of several hours, preventing them from leaving.

Like Jaws, Cujo contains an economic subplot, though the collapse of the cereal company and its effect on the advertising agency Vic runs is not presented as an incredibly important plot point the way the beaches being kept open in Jaws is. However, the romantic subplot, which involves Donna and Vic’s best friend Steve, which fizzles out after the forty minute mark where the film becomes an isolated movie about two people trapped in their car in the middle of nowhere.

The main difference between Cujo and Jaws is that Jaws has actual moments of horror and there is enough to it to keep the viewer invested in the characters. Cujo is entirely lacking in that. I am not a fan of gore, or even overly scary movies, but Cujo’s problem is not the lack of gore; it is that the movie features a series of situations that are drawn out for the horror value, as opposed to a practical sense of fright relative to the events. Watching the film the second time, I found myself wondering why Donna did not just throw the car in neutral, and antagonize Cujo into pushing the car backward down the hill; the hill the farm is on is steep enough that if the car rolled just a little ways, it would get going out of the trap the Trentons find themselves in.

Regardless, Cujo spends the bulk of its time with a kid who is terribly annoying screaming in fright as the dog sits near the car and his mother tries to calm him. Lacking characters who are at all empathetic, it is impossible to care what happens in Cujo. Ultimately, that is the death knell of the film and it bores the viewer instead of terrifying them.

For other films with strong canine characters, please visit my reviews of:
I Am Legend
Hotel For Dogs
Scooby-Doo!

1/10

Check out how this film stacks up against others I have reviewed by visiting my Movie Review Index Page where the reviews are organized from best work to worst.

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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More Subtle Than Exceptional, Better Homes And Gardens Vanilla Caramel Spice Scented Wax Cubes Still Work!

The Good: Smells good, Easy to use, Reusable
The Bad: A little expensive, Requires other hardware to use, Does not solve any causes of odor.
The Basics: Better Homes And Gardens Vanilla Caramel Spice Scented Wax Cubes are an expensive way to scent the house without eliminating the causes of bad smells.


My wife, who enjoys making the house smell wonderful, has moved from autumn to winter in our home. A fan of the Baked Apple Strudel Scented Wax Cubes (reviewed here!) that she had for autumn, she is now onto the winter scent. As a result, we now have Better Homes And Gardens Vanilla Caramel Spice Scented Wax Cubes making the house smell delightful.

A seasonal favorite, Better Homes And Gardens Vanilla Caramel Spice Scented Wax Cubes consists of six blocks, each one approximately 1” long by 1” wide by 7/8” deep and ivory colored. These blocks take about half an hour to liquefy and the scent of cinnamon, vanilla, and smooth caramel spreads out from the heated source that melts the wax. So long as it is in its liquid state, the Better Homes And Gardens Vanilla Caramel Spice Scented Wax Cubes cause the rich aroma of caramel to spread through at least three medium-sized rooms. The smell of vanilla blends with the caramel and cinnamon scents at occasional intervals; it hardly smells like vanilla most of the time.

Initially, I thought the Better Homes And Gardens Vanilla Caramel Spice Scented Wax Cubes were a bit expensive. However, because they cool and can be reheated later on, they are entirely reusable. This makes them a better value than one might suspect.

Ultimately, Better Homes And Gardens Vanilla Caramel Spice Scented Wax Cubes are easy to use and smell good, but they do not eliminate the causes of odors, making it a bit less valuable than some good scented cleaning products.

For other products designed to change the scent in the home, check out my reviews of:
Febreze Limited Edition Falling Leaves & Spice Air Effects Spray
Renuzit Adjustables Limited Edition Mandarin Lemonade
Clorox Lemon Fresh Disinfecting Wipes

5/10

For other home and garden product reviews, please visit my index page!

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Movie References Abound For Psych Season Six . . . But It Doesn’t Have Much Else Going For It.

The Good: Great guest stars, Character progressions
The Bad: Exceptionally predictable plots, Formulaic, Relies upon the guest stars, ?! Chief Vick!?
The Basics: The sixth season of Psych is fun, but objectively underwhelming, especially for fans of the series.


I can always tell when a series is in decline. The moment in any formulaic show comes when the formula is stale enough that the series relies almost entirely on guest stars to carry the show. For Psych, that hits with the sixth season. The show is not unenjoyable, but it is completely predictable.

In its sixth season, Psych continues its formula and of starting an episode with a murder and Shawn and Gus finding a way to get assigned to the case. Shawn then, by pretending to be psychic but really just observing clues that others are oblivious or not privy to, solves the case by finding the murderer. In the sixteen episodes that make up Psych, the show modifies its formula to do theme shows based on famous films or television series’. In fact, this season, all of the episodes are based on movies or television shows, following the season premiere involving a murder at the British embassy after Shawn breaks in to steal a Darth Vader figure away from the son of the Ambassador.

Psych Season Six is essentially made up of episodes that are parodies of The Hangover, vampire films, comic book movies (most notably Superman), Girl, Interrupted, The Sting, Wanderlust, the Indiana Jones franchise, the works of Neil Simon, The Shining, The Bachelorette, and Chinatown. Other than the individual episode themes, which is continuing with themed episodes like Season Five’s parody of Twin Peaks, Psych is a pretty predictable series of formulaic episodes in Season Six.

In the sixth season, the primary characters are:

Shawn – Experiments with diplomatic immunity when he takes a case at an Embassy when he discovers a dead body after crashing a party there the previous night. He relives a childhood dream by taking the case of a baseball coach he helped as a kid and becomes a batting coach. He fakes being crazy to try to prove a man guilty at an insane asylum and then tries to reunite Juliet with her father. He and Desperaux hunt down an art collector’s work until Desperaux appears killed, forcing him to accept death for the first time in his life. After Lassister moves into his own new apartment, he and Gus are excited to get hired to figure out how the apartment is actually haunted. His appendix bursts when he is performing with Gus’s a capella group. He comes to aid Woody when it appears Woody made a mistake in an autopsy. He and Juliet come into conflict when one of Juliet’s old cases is freed from prison and Shawn works to exonerate him. Shawn also has the opportunity to solve a case his father worked on, but never solved,

Gus – Inadvertantly dates the daughter of a notorious killer! When stalking a potential vampire, he dresses as Blackula. When Shawn becomes a first base coach for the Seabirds, he gets stuck as the team's mascot! He dates a patient at the mental facility. He eagerly adopts the life of a hippie when the guys investigate threats made against members of a commune. He falls for one of them and ends up lonely when Shawn and Juliet go for a lover’s weekend. He becomes the token black guy on the reality dating show when a candidate on it is almost murdered. His friends from the a capella group come back and need his help when their mentor is shot and Shawn is hospitalized. He helps to champion Thane when he is released from prison,

Juliet – Thrilled that Shawn wants her to move in, she is disappointed when she learns the truth. She completely disbelieves the possibility of vampires in the vampire case. She is irked by Shawn when he brings her conman father back into her life for a complicated series of heists that he may or may not be in on. She is upset when Shawn tries to get Thane exonerated,

Lassiter – Furious that Juliet is dating Shawn, he hooks her up to a polygraph and requests a new partner. He hooks up with a vampirelover whose roommates are involved in a crime. After a murder victim is found hanging in a real nice apartment, he moves in in order to have a place for them both to live,

Chief Vick - Is she actually in this season?! Even Woody the coroner gets more airtime this season,

and Henry – worried that the case at the British Embassy may be too much for Shawn to crack on his own, he does some actual detective work to aid his son. When a murder victim whose body is finally recovered reveals to him that his coworkers twenty years ago were corrupt, he becomes deeply disillusioned.

In Psych Season 6, the acting is flawless, with Kurt Fuller getting more airtime, almost enough to make him a regular. The main cast is so seasoned by this point that they have nothing unsurprising from them in season six. The show dilutes its regular, well-gelled cast with the likes of Malcolm McDowell, William Shatner, Polly Walker, Danny Glover, Brad Dourif, Tony Hale, Cary Elwes, Madchen Amick, John Rhy-Davies, Sarah Rue, and Anthony Anderson. The prevalence of big name guest stars overwhelm the show.

Ultimately, Psych Season 6 is not as funny as prior seasons, but they make up for that with a higher caliber of guest stars. The show seems far more familiar than fresh than ever before, even though it is not unenjoyable.

For prior seasons of Psych, check out my reviews of:
Season 1
Season 2
Season 3
Season 4
Season 5

4.5/10

For other television reviews, visit my Television Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Sunny Can Burn This! (I'm SO Out of the Club Now!) Shawn Colvin’s Whole New You!

The Good: Excellent voice, Good melodies, Some decent lyrics
The Bad: Not musically ambitious, Some predictable rhymes
The Basics: Vocally and musically weak and airy (so much so, it floated right past the Light Adult Contemporary radio's attention), Whole New You fails to engage the listener.


After my panning of an Indigo Girls album (Shaming Of The Sun), I've become paranoid that the feminists and the ACLU (not to mention GLADD) are going to descend upon me and tear up my membership cards. With that fear of losing what little community I might have from the progressives (because otherwise, I'm a hermit!), I rushed out to find another Lilith Fair artist to review and album by and that led me to Shawn Colvin's Whole New You.

Shawn Colvin, perhaps best known for her 1997 single "Sunny Came Home," took a few years from touring to have a baby (actually, I saw a picture back in the day of her on stage very pregnant performing) and work on raising the child. She resurfaced in 2001 with this album and . . . the Industry had pretty much already written her off as a one-hit wonder. And the truth is, after listening to Whole New You several times, it's pretty easy to see why.

With only eleven tracks and clocking in at only Whole New You is short. It's short and small. What I mean by that is that while some of the tracks sound good (it opens very well with "A Matter Of Minutes" and Whole New You), there is nothing big here. There is nothing grand, there is impressive here. Shawn Colvin does not appear to have grown as an artist in the intervening years. There's no "Sunny Came Home" here; nothing so different or intriguing that it gets the listener to stop everything, sit up and say, "Wow, I want to hear that again!"

Musically, Shawn Colvin maintains her place on the pop-folk border, though Whole New You is definitely more in the pop territory. Unlike her previous outings that told whole developed stories or relied on weird allusions and imagery, Whole New You is more simple and direct. Colvin's poems are more declarative than creative here.

In this way, it's disappointing. Probably more than the writing, the disappointing aspect is that the sound is not bigger. Colvin seems trapped in a place where she's singing and accompanied by guitars, bass, keyboard and drums (primarily). Trombones, clarinets and a flugelhorn pop up on the album, but they seem very distant. In that photograph I mentioned seeing, I recall seeing Colvin with a guitar strapped around her. Perhaps the creative disconnect with Whole New You is that she is distanced from the music by the simple fact that she is not playing an instrument here.

That said, I give a lot of credit to Shawn Colvin for her creative enterprise. All eleven tracks on Whole New You are co-written by Colvin, so she had a lot of input in creating the lyrics and music and crafting this album. So, unlike a great number of more commercially successful performers who simply are assembled by a studio, Colvin worked hard to create the eleven tracks on the album.

Some of the lyrics are truly inspired, actually. From a simple poetics standpoint, Shawn Colvin is talented. For example, on "A Matter Of Minutes," Colvin abandons the convenient short lines standard to most music and expressively declares, "If there's one thing certain it's there ain't nothing for sure / And I want to run but I can't do that anymore / I can't meet you half way and I can't have it my way and I can't give up without a fight . . ." That impressed me some.

More impressive is the thematic unity of Whole New You, though as I write that it occurs to me this might be a concept album. Unlike most albums that obsess on love or the ending of relationships, Whole New You is about change. If there is a running theme throughout the album, it is the importance of making changes in one's life. Ironically, the album does not feel like it is repetitive, though almost every song deals with changing life, location and/or the changing world ("Another Plane Went Down").

Still, it's not enough to recommend. Colvin's vocals are mousy and often insubstantial and Whole New You fails to resonate with any lasting depth.

Because I don't want to go out with such a bad taste, I'd like to say that for those considering this album, perhaps a better choice would be pretty much anything from Dar Williams. Dar Williams starts strong, but has grown pretty steadily with each album. Her debut, The Honesty Room (reviewed here!) is an excellent place to begin.

Shawn Colvin may be an admirable person and a good artist, but it's almost impossible to make the latter case based on Whole New You. The best track is the opening "A Matter Of Minutes." I remain underwhelmed by "Mr. Levon" both lyrically and musically.

For other folk-rock reviews, please check out:
Any Day Now - Joan Baez
American Favorite Ballads - Pete Seeger
Covers - James Taylor

5/10

For other music reviews, please check out my Music Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2012, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Irish Voyager Fanfic: “Spirit Folk” Is One Of The Worst Episodes Of The Franchise!

The Good: ? Revisits a dangling plotline?
The Bad: Terrible plot, Irish stereotypes, Mediocre acting, Poor character development
The Basics: Star Trek: Voyager revisits Fair Haven where the residents becomes aware of how odd the crew of Voyager is.


Sometimes, I find myself wondering how an episode of a television series ever made it to the air. With “Spirit Folk,” a sequel to “Fair Haven” (reviewed here!), I am entirely convinced that the episode exists because the budget for “Fair Haven” was so great. While I usually am thrilled when a television series tries to revisit its dangling plot and character elements, “Spirit Folk” problematically revisits one of the most banal settings and subplots in the Star Trek: Voyager plot and the Star Trek universe and the result is one of the very worst episodes of the entire franchise.

Worse than being terrible on its own – filled with Irish stereotypes, hammy acting, and a serious deficiency of character development among the main cast – “Spirit Folk” completely rips off Star Trek: The Next Generation. On Star Trek: The Next Generation, one of the classic Holodeck adventure episodes was “Elementary, Dear Data” (reviewed here!) where the Professor Moriarty character in Data’s Sherlock Holmes program became sentient. It was smartly followed up on with “Ship In A Bottle” (reviewed here!) where the sentient Moriarty returned and demanded his freedom from the holodeck. “Spirit Folk” returns to a far less compelling holodeck setting and it creates a plot that is nowhere near as compelling on either the plot or character front, but with a similar sense of reversal.

Tom Paris is riding around Fair Haven in his brand new automobile when his tire gets bent out and Seamus witnesses him restoring the tire with a Holodeck command. Seamus becomes convinced that Tom Paris is a Spirit Folk, a fairy, and he begins pointing out to others in Fair Haven the irregularities in the Voyager crew. When Seamus and another person witness Paris transforming Harry’s date, Maggie, into a cow, chaos erupts.

Tom Paris and B’Elanna Torres realize the holodeck is degrading because the Fair Haven program has been running constantly. With Paris and Kim trapped within the program after trying to reprogram Michael Sullivan to forget all about the starship, the Doctor is also captured. When Michael takes the Doctor’s mobile emitter, he and Janeway work outside the holodeck to save Fair Haven.

“Spirit Folk” is a lousy sequel episode to a one-note original Star Trek: Voyager episode. Ridiculously early in the episode, Torres notes that Fair Haven can be reprogrammed, but Paris and Kim cannot. How Paris does not end this episode utterly pissed at Janeway for risking his life and the life of his best friend when they could have turned the program off long before he was put in mortal peril is troubling at best, disturbing at worst. Janeway’s note that the program may not be real, but the relationships are falls especially flat; Fair Haven has been running full time for about a month at this point, whereas her relationship with Kim and Paris has been constant for over five years.

In addition to not expressing or explaining the emotions between Janeway and Michael Sullivan, “Spirit Folk” falls down because the characters are utterly simplistic. When the Irish characters are not played as hyperbolic stereotypes of Irish country folk, they are played as simpletons and Janeway’s resolution for the episode is also ridiculous.

Robert Picardo, who can usually be counted upon for a strong performance no matter what he is given, is compelled to play the Doctor as a ridiculous parody of himself in “Spirit Folk.” Mulgrew and Fintan McKeown continue to play their characters without any sense of compelling chemistry and their stiffness is not the death knell of the episode. In fact, to belabor the problems with this episode is simply to beat the dead horse: there is nothing interesting, compelling, or even enjoyable in “Spirit Folk.”

[Knowing that VHS is essentially a dead medium, it's worth looking into Star Trek: Voyager - The Complete Sixth Season on DVD, which is also a better economical choice than buying the VHS. Read my review of the penultimate season here!
Thanks!]

For other works with Ian Abercrombie, be sure to check out my reviews of:
Rango
The Clone Wars - Season 3
The Clone Wars - Season 2
The Clone Wars - Season 1
The Clone Wars
“Someone To Watch Over Me” - Star Trek: Voyager
Addams Family Values

0/10

For other Star Trek episode and movie reviews, please visit my Star Trek Review Index Page!

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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