Castle Season 5 (including Spoilers)

[Greg Cox]

Okay, that was a lot of fun, and gave CSI's "scifi convention" ep a run for its money.

[Neroon]

Flat out a blast to watch! Like "Galaxy Quest" in that it poked the right amount of fun yet still had time and sense for a complimentary view of cosplay and being a geeky fan.

[Balrog]

'Final Frontier' ROCKED! I haven't laughed so much in a long time. I won't give anything away, but the nods to Trek and other sci-fi are brilliant.

[Christopher]

Okay, now I wanna see Nebula 9. I'm intrigued by the Oracle character -- love to know the backstory there.

Fun episode, though it's a shame they couldn't corral more big SFTV names for the guest cast. They got Armin Shimerman for one scene, and Frakes directed, but otherwise it was straight-up basic cable: Ed Quinn from Eureka and Erin Way from Alphas. I'd kind of gotten the impression there'd be some Firefly cast showing up, so I was a bit disappointed there. Although Quinn did bear a striking resemblance to Fillion. And overall it was so much fun that it made up for the casting.

And speaking of satisfying appearances... Alexis. Wow.

I'm surprised how many real SF shows/films they were able to reference. The Marvel references and cosplay make sense, what with ABC being Disney-owned. The Star Wars refs were a bit surprising, since surely this was made before the Lucasfilm sale was announced -- although maybe they already knew it'd be happening so it was cleared. But there were also a lot of Trek references (including Fillion doing both Shatner and Stewart impressions), mentions of Blade Runner, etc.

What's nice is that apparently we've grown past the era when SF/fantasy as a whole was seen as a fringe or niche interest that had to be justified and defended. Everyone was a fan of one thing or another. Castle and Beckett are both megafans of their own distinct things, Esposito likes Blade Runner, Ryan's into sword and sorcery, and Alexis was cosplaying as... wow. Beckett's big monologue justifying her love for the show came close to the usual defense of "Sure, it looks cheesy, but it's also inspiring and meaningful," but it was just the one particular cult show, not the whole genre, that was treated as needing a defense.

The main thing I had trouble with was the working lasers. No way could something that tiny contain that much power with present-day technology. Any portable unit, if it were possible, would probably need a heavy backpack to carry the power cells. And no way could one hobbyist working alone come up with such a revolutionary breakthrough. They strayed a little too much into science-fiction territory there.

[intrinsical]

That, was SO FUN! Not even 5 minutes into the episode and references are dropping all over the place! Jonathan Frakes, Star Wars, Spiderman, Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica, Joss Whedon, Blade Runner.

[TimmyWl]

I thought it was hilarious and especially the mutual decision of Castle/Alexis of never mentioning what happened at the convention. The two went their seperate ways. Then there was the final scene at the end with Beckett with the mask on. That was equally hiliarious.

[Forbin]

Somebody needs to make a compilation DVD of TV shows with sci fi con spoof episodes. And dammit, I'm trying to think of others besides the CSI one and the She-Wolf of London one. I know there were more!

[Forbin]

Forbin wrote:

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Somebody needs to make a compilation DVD of TV shows with sci fi con spoof episodes. And dammit, I'm trying to think of others besides the CSI one and the She-Wolf of London one. I know there were more!

Ah! Seems Bones had one too.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1359122/

[Balrog]

I loved that Armin Shimerman's character was essentially Quark.

[Christopher]

Kernel Klink wrote:

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I loved that Armin Shimerman's character was essentially Quark.

How so? He was an eccentric inventor, not a bartender/con man. I didn't see any particular resemblance between the characters.

[Balrog]

^IMO, when he began selling his wares, Klingon Bat'leths and whatnot.

[Christopher]

Okay, so he was a businessman, but that's a far cry from being Quark. Castle sells his creations for money too, but that doesn't make him Quark.

[Nerys Myk]

Without his beard, Ed Quinn looks like the love child of Scott Bakula and Harrison Ford.

[Balrog]

^^Ummm... Did you not see "IMO" in my last post, Christopher? I get it - you don't agree. That's fine. Let's agree to disagree, dude.

[Christopher]

I don't understand the defensiveness. This is a discussion board. There's nothing to discuss if nobody ever disagrees. Disagreement is not attack, it's just conversation. Which is what I thought we were all here to engage in.