Not Sure How I Feel About CSI 0920

Tonight’s episdoe of CSI, “A Space Oddity”, promised to be an interesting one: a death at a scifi convention. I’m still not quite sure if it was a parody, an homage, or outright mocking. I say this despite the fact that the principle writers have a connection to the genre.

First off… I have to say that just about any excuse for more Liz Vassey air time is a good excuse in my book. I’ve been a continuous Liz Vassey fan since the early 90s. Given the theme of this CSI episode, it’s a little ironic that among her credits is Star Trek: The Next Generation (while Wallace Langham, who plays David Hodges, appeared on Star Trek: Voyager).

That said, I’m still sort of all over the place with this episode. The core of it was based on fan reaction at a con of the reimagined Battlestar Galactica. It was getting ugly until Richard Hatch (original series Apollo, reimagined series Tom Zarek) calmed things back down.

The Star Trek recreations, though…they left something to be desired. Forget the low production values… the writing just wasn’t what I’d have expected. True, the scenes patterned after the episodes “The Cage” and “The Gamesters of Triskelion” were easily recognizable to those such as me, but they still seemed slightly “off”. Enough so that the sort of parody/homage that was done with Galaxy Quest didn’t quite make it here on the small screen. It actually felt more like a Shatner “Get a life” moment.

I don’t know. The writers were Battlestar people, but the principle actors have a Star Trek connection. My long-lived inner geek says that it was meant with the best of intentions, but the execution didn’t quite meet expectations.

Oh, and that “redux”. That was just awful. I was actually happy that the fictional full-of-himself producer got fictionally murdered. He fictionally deserved it for that fictional sack of skiffy poo. Yeech.