I finally got round to watching Star Trek: Beyond on Friday evening, having been sufficiently unimpressed with its astronomically boring predecessor that I felt no interest in watching any new Star Trek ever again. Say what you like about the original series, but it generally didn't present Spock's personal growth in terms of enthusiastic punching people to ridiculous "Pow!" sounds. Having heard that Beyond was actually a bit more like normal Star Trek than this, I decided I would give it a go, and indeed found it an enjoyable space romp that had finally grasped the concept of a bit of character development, i.e. not making that heroes actively unpleasant.

Nonetheless, some idiocy remains, and I'm not just talking about miniskirts without flame-retardant leggings. I'm not sure whether the decision to name a starship USS Franklin reflected the rather tedious inability to remember that the Federation is not actually meant to be the United States Empire in space, or someone's idea of dramatic irony. However I feel that if personally were in charge of naming a new starship destined to voyage into the unknown to seek out new worlds and new civilizations I would prefer to name it after a successful explorer: the USS Amundsen.

On the other hand, it might have been worse...

LOCATION: STARFLEET COMMAND

- Commander, the result of the public vote to name the new Starfleet vessel is about to be announced!

- USS Shippy McShipface.