anim8rfsk <anim8rfsk@cox.net> wrote:

>The Ark, S01E03 "Get out and Push"

>"An asteroid is headed for us!"

>No. It's not. By definition it's not. Whatever's out there that's gonna
>smack you right in the face and hopefully kill you all, it's not an
>asteroid. The second word said on this episode is wrong.

I've seen Space 1999. These things just head straight out into the solar
system.

>Ian, that scene from future episodes we keep seeing about the
>lightspeed engines, she's now saying "near lightspeed"

>So they are traveling ridiculously fast in normal space and relativity
>is attached.

>Our reluctant heroes are chatting about their options. The guy who
>shouldn't be captain, but thinks he is, wants to use the solar sails.
>The ginger robot says they're too far from a star. Duh. So he says that
>they should divert the power into the almost light speed engines which
>were shut down from overheating because they had drained the coolant,
>so that makes no sense, and everybody just ignores what he said anyway.
>Suddenly alarms go off, indicating an asteroid is coming at them (it's
>not) And they're all scared and stuff.

>I don't think the writers, and I use that word very loosely, have taken
>into consideration the fact that they are stopped dead. They are a
>light year from the nearest asteroid. And they're an awfully small
>target.

>By the way, I finally got a good look at the whole ship, and all the
>rotating sections are rotating the same way, which means the damn thing
>should be precessing in the opposite direction. Also, the way it's
>turning, last week when the guy got speared by the narwhale, they were
>on the aft section. Which means they got starboard wrong by any
>definition.

Shouldn't the center section be rotating too?

>Oh, yeah, they say that if they don't get the engines back up to near
>lightspeed, they'll miss Proxima B. Why? They're stopped dead in space.
>It's not like Proxima B is much of a moving target. This is like your
>car breaking down in the middle of the Mojave desert and you saying
>that if you don't get back up to 55 miles an hour you're going to miss
>Los Angeles. No, you're not. You might miss a scheduled arrival time
>but you aren't gonna miss the city. Neither of you is going anywhere.

>Oh my God. The ginger robot is asking the only surviving navigator if
>he can find a closer star system for them to go to. There's not going
>to be anything closer than Proxima B. That's why they're going there.
>It's the closest place to go!

They are so far off course, they're in the Delta Quadrant.

>The only one who knows how to fix the engines is the same woman who is
>the only one who knows how to fix the water reclamation unit. Not to
>mention she's the one who broke the engines in the first place.

>Glasses girl gets both god and science wrong.

>It's the Ark's drift that is moving it in front of the asteroid (which
>is in turn coming at them at tremendous speed). They are drifting? When
>did that start? And Shirley they must have some sort of thrusters. If
>they move the thing a mile in any direction, that should do it.

>There's an incredibly stupid commercial about how comic book companies
>don't hire Black people. It doesn't actually end with anybody saying
>that's wrong or the guy whose story it is getting a job. He just says
>his mother was nice about it. WTF?

>Close-up of the Ark. Ian is so lucky to be able to watch this in 4K!

>The idiot doctor (who slept through somebody stealing all her drugs on the
>other side of a curtain) says that she has to do a physical on the guy
>whose hand was eaten away by space diamonds because his file was corrupted.
>They have six hours to live. And she's insisting she needs to do physicals.

They couldn't even pay to have a graphic of the medical file made up. It
was all blurry. Also, I wondered if she were seeing things from all the
drugs she's taken, which should have made her heart stop by now.

>Hey! They're finally in the gigantic room where they got the pre-lift
>off peptalk! It's all full of comfy couches where people are sitting
>and chatting like they were in a shopping mall before the stores
>opened.

In the backstory, I thought that was on the base, not in the ship
itself. I'm confused.

>The odds of being hit by an asteroid just drifting in space are one in
>700,326. Because that makes sense.

>Actually, the odds of you being hit by an asteroid 4/5 of the way between
>Earth and Proxima B are absolutely zero. Also, they got so tired of saying
>Proxima B that now they just call it Prox B.

This was explained in the ship's announcement: "Because the universe is
out to get us."

>With four hours to go it occurs to them that they have shuttles. Lots and
>lots of shuttles, or just a few with unlimited fuel supplies since they
>were going to use them to take all 300 people down to the planet. Also,
>another shot of the ship from below shows there are domes all over the
>place facing in all different directions.

>Turns out there's only one shuttle. The shuttle isn't berthed, it just
>hangs down below from the super structure. Which means you don't have
>to uncouple it from the ark. You can just use the engines as they are.
>There would be no possible reason to unattach it, and fly around and
>look for a place on the Ark to shove and use it in a way other than it
>was intended. I haven't watched the next segment yet, but I am taking
>bets.

Why was the shuttle attached to the structure? Is that because it's
supposed to be used as a maintenance craft for the ship's hull? I don't
see how it's usable in an emergency.

>The shuttle won't start! It turns out various people have been
>scavenging it for parts to fix other systems. And yet it didn't occur
>to any of them that it was actually there. Also, there doesn't seem to
>be any way to get to the shuttle from the Ark in the first place.

Yeah. It looked like you had to take a space walk to get on board. It
made no sense.

>The parts are not plug and play which means they're going to have to
>re-calibrate everything even though they're taking the original parts and
>putting them back where they got them in the first place and even though
>they're talking about stuff like fuel hoses.

That hose sure needed a lot of careful recalibration.

>Plan C is to blow a hole in the hull and let the escaping air pressure push
>them out of the way. Because they don't have airlocks I guess.

Saved the cost of building another set.

>Luckily the missing shuttle fuel hose, a standard 1 foot length of
>translucent plastic hose available at any auto parts store they have in
>Serbia, attaches right underneath the command chair so they don't have to
>build another set. But the shuttle doesn't start so the pilot tells the
>guy who is trying to fix it to stop fixing it because... I have no idea. Nor
>do I have any idea why he thought it would start when there's a guy right
>next to him still fixing it in the first place.

>The missing power coupler is returned! Why did they think it would start
>without that? Luckily it attaches right behind the command chair so they
>don't have to build another set. But the shuttle still won't start.

>Until the pilot kicks it! And it starts! And then it stops again.

Shouldn't that have been a huge hint that there was a loose connection
in the vicinity of where he kicked it?

>In the shower room, where they're going to blow a hole in the hull because
>there aren't any doors that open to space like airlocks, the worthless
>cargo people are having a dance party. The ginger robot beats them up and
>gives them three seconds to clean up their mess and get out. Of course,
>they just leave without cleaning up any mess because three seconds.

>They've made a fertilizer bomb out of the people they've gotten killed so
>far because there are no explosives on the Ark because why would you
>possibly need explosives to start a colony on an unknown world? They attach
>the bomb to what is clearly not an exterior wall.

>KA-BOOM!

Now they won't be able to grow any food and they'll starve. They didn't
even discuss consequences.

>They blow a hole! Now that we can see the explosion from the outside, it
>comes out from what should have been the floor. But they stuck the bimb on
>the wall. Which means they've got gravity going at 90 deg to how it should.
>Also, I don't think I'd have blown a hole in the rotating section.
>Certainly not my first choice. And certainly not without calculations, as
>to when to set it off!

There was an X on the wall. How can that not have been in just the right
spot?

>Hey, the nerdy botanist who built the bomb looks just like Boz in RIPTIDE!
>Think he'll build a robot next?

>They decide not to make a ship wide announcement that they're setting off a
>bomb, because that would scare people more than a big kaboom out of
>nowhere.

>It worked, the asteroid will now miss them by 586 m.

>Meanwhile the shuttle pilot has fixed the shuttle and run all the way to
>the command deck to tell them he's ready to use the shuttle to move the
>Ark. Because he's forgotten they have an intercom.

>Girl with the glasses, in the nose of the ship, suddenly realizes the
>"asteroid" has a tail. She runs to the bridge to tell them the asteroid has
>a tail! Because she's forgotten they have an intercom.

Boy was that dramatic.

>It's a comet! And they get entirely wrong why comets have tails. Anyway,
>that means it's made of ice and ice is made of water and therefore the
>comet is drinkable. But how can they get the water? They have "miles and
>miles" of ship to ship refueling hose aboard! What? Why? There isn't
>another ship. And their engines are nuclear. What the hell were they going
>to pump through refueling hose? And why have they been cannibalizing
>working systems for hose?

Aren't those hoses full of fuel?

I was confused as to why the water just flowed. It was pressurized. I
wanted it to come out as ice cubes.

>They must match speed and course with the comet! But how? They don't have
>engines! They think about this for a while because they've all forgotten
>the shuttle. Already.

>OMG. Girl with glasses explains that the tiny shuttle can get the ark
>moving at the fantastic velocity of the comet because they're in space. And
>I quote:

>"Lieutenant Brice is using the shuttle like a booster rocket to accelerate
>the Ark up to the comet's velocity"

>"OK but how can something so small get us moving so fast?"

>"We're in space. There's no gravity, no friction or resistance. Size
>doesn't matter, just force."

>Apparently there's no mass, either. She goes on to explain further and even
>cites the laws of physics. As Bugs Bunny once said "I never studied law".

Heh

>The accelerating shuttle can only bring the ark up to 87% of the comet's
>incredible velocity. But that should be enough for the miles and miles of
>fueling hose to hook them together and drag the Ark up the rest of the way.

>Oh my God. My eyes and ears are starting to bleed.

87% of the speed of the comet explains why they could only fill up the
water tank 90%.

>When Bryce detached the shuttle from the ark, he accidentally pushed the
>Ark the other way, and now the incredible strain will tear the shuttle
>apart! But in the meantime, they are pumping water. I have no idea where
>they're getting water from because, you know, comet made of ice.

>Also, the other end of the fueling hose in the ark is just open to the
>compartment the people are in and pouring water that's splashing on them
>because it's moving water so it must be safe to drink.

How many times do we have to go through this on Usenet? Water that flows
is safe to drink. I'll ask clouddreamer to explain it to you.

>There's a lot of drama as the people on the ark think 97% of water capacity
>is OK but Brice holds out for 100! Then he starts the engines while he's
>facing the wrong way but they don't actually do anything until he turns
>around. And the asteroid, I mean comet hurdles away from the Ark, even
>though they had matched speed and velocity, because... Oh, hell I give up.

>They all just start drinking the water. No reason to test it.

>Ginger robot slinks away. Hot blonde finally shows up. She throws off her
>clothes and has another non-naked shower scene, this time with water.

>But why did Ginger robot slink away? Oh, I bet she'd shoot off sparks and
>explode if she drank water.

>They recover some of the stolen drugs, which were apparently being used in
>the shower party. Now the overtired only doctor left alive on board can
>have a drug problem!

You didn't see that coming.

>Hot blonde wears a wig to cover that her head is all one big burn from
>getting caught in a UV storm a few years ago. Luckily it didn't affect any
>part of her that's not covered by a wig.

I thought it was a fire or cancer. That makes no sense at all.

>We find out there is a rule that no existing couples could be on the same
>ark because genetic diversity. Because that makes sense.

Hey! They said in dialogue that it made no sense. Clearly there was some
evil fertility doctor using his own seed to create all those babies.

>With five minutes to go, Cox cable locks up.

>During the lock up, the guy who wants to be, but shouldn't be captain got a
>secret video from the guy who was murdered in the first episode. It shows
>the ginger robot killed a guy in a bar who was trying to rape her. That's
>the big secret? Who cares?

Did you see the way she fought him? I'm buying your robot theory.

>Next week nobody mentions almost lightspeed engines. And apparently they've
>completely forgotten that they are now going the wrong direction at the
>incredible velocity of the comet.