Hello World!

Until a month and a half ago, I never liked Russell Crowe. That is to say, I didn't have much of an opinion of him one way or the other. I thought he gave a good performance in Gladiator. I avoided headlines about him and Meg Ryan or him and Nicole Kidman or him and whoever the celebrity scandal of the month might have been. I was impressed by him in A Beautiful Mind but so annoyed that that film beat The Fellowship of the Ring and Moulin Rouge at the Academy Awards that I held it against him, though of course it wasn't his fault.

Since I saw Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World for the...um...fifth time, however, I've been a Russell Crowe groupie.

It wasn't enough just to rewatch A Beautiful Mind; I had to get the special edition DVD, so I could watch all the extras and listen to the commentary and interviews. I devoured the deleted scenes from Gladiator and bought The Sum of Us, since it was obvious I couldn't live without two seconds of his posterior and several minutes of his extended gay makeout scenes. I dug out Virtuosity, which I first watched because Louise Fletcher is in it (I know Kai Winn fans will understand this). I even rewatched L.A. Confidential, despite the annoying Kim Basinger factor.

I discovered to my very great pleasure that I had never actually sold my press kit from The Insider on eBay, meaning that I have actual Russell Crowe slides in my house. I went digging through a four-year pile of Entertainment Weeklys, only to discover that I'm missing the January 4th, 2002 issue, which not only has Crowe on the cover but also contains the Non-Geek's Guide to The Lord of the Rings.

I'm a self-admitted fangirl, but I try not to fixate in actors; at worst, they tend to be egotistical and wholly obnoxious influences on popular culture, and at best, their adoring public can't really know them anyway. Unfortunately this fascination shows no signs of abating.

If I rent Mystery, Alaska again, everyone here will believe that it's because I want to see Colm Meaney, right?

Trek BBS Today

Below are some of the topics currently being discussed at the Trek BBS:

-Does Miles O'Brien come from a united Ireland?

-Does Archer need a nemesis like Dukat or the Borg Queen?

-Assuming that Star Wars: Episode III is watchable, what would people like to see in it?

More topics can be found at the Trek BBS!

Trek Two Years Ago

These were some of the major news items from late December 2001:

• Thumbs-Up For Stewart's 'Christmas Carol'
  Patrick Stewart (Captain Picard) garnered rave reviews for his one-man performance of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, with comments like The Hollywood Reporter's: "It is an intelligent and wonderfully theatrical adaptation that suffers not a whit from the absence of other performers onstage."

• Montgomery: Trek Has No Racial Boundaries
  "I love the fact that Star Trek has always been a show that does not have racial boundaries at all," Anthony Montgomery said, discussing his position as an African-American role model playing Travis Mayweather on Enterprise. "We're bridging gaps, and Star Trek has done that for years."

• Keating Excited By 'Enterprise' Paycheck
  "It was the biggest cheque I'd ever received for acting," Dominic Keating said of his first paycheck from Enterprise, saying that he was awed by the millions he would receive for appearing on the series.

More news can be found in the archives.

Poll Results

Below are the results of the most recent TrekToday poll:

How Do You Feel About Romance In Trek? I like it; I think some Trek romances are great 38.7% - (249 Votes) I don't like it; I think most Trek romances are handled poorly 20.9% - (135 Votes) I'm indifferent to it; I don't love or hate it 16.7% - (108 Votes) I love it; I think Trek does romance really well 10.8% - (70 Votes) I hate it; I think Trek doesn't do romance well at all 7.3% - (47 Votes) No opinion on it one way or another 5.2% - (34 Votes) Total Votes: 643

Please vote in our new poll on New Year's resolutions!

Happy Birthday!

Best wishes to Nichelle Nichols, the original series' Lieutenant Uhura, who turns 70 today!

Today's Television Listings

On New Year's Eve at 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time, UPN will show Enterprise's "Exile". Here's TV Guide's synopsis of the episode:

A powerful telepath named Tarquin (Maury Sterling) becomes smitten with Hoshi and offers to part with key intelligence on the Xindi if she's allowed to visit his planet. But when Enterprise returns to pick up Hoshi, Tarquin refuses to let her go.

Discuss this news item at Trek BBS!
 Add TrekToday RSS feed to your news reader or My Yahoo!
Also a CSI: Crime Scene Investigation fan? Then visit CSIFiles.com!