I have no idea who, statistically speaking, are the fans of this new Abrams Trek movie, but generally speaking, they are essentially the real future of mankind.
If there are fans of this NEW Star Trek, who are in fact early fans of the original series, these must be people who don't much care about continuity or logical character development or even some sort of logical 'science' in the 'science fiction.'
People are entitled to like whatever they want, but, being a limited Star Trek fan myself, not knowing 'everything there is to know' about it, I still can't help but be utterly baffled by their existence.
I'm sure there are coined terms already in existence, but I'm not that interested in searching them out for now, I'll just make some up for the purpose of this article.
The SuperTrekker: likes every series and all the movies.
The Trekkian: likes the Original Series, The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, and Enterprise
The Treklodyte: likes the Original Series and the films starring Shatner.
The Trekonian: Original Series and a few of the Shatner movies, an OS fanatic.
The Trekker: Original Series, The Next Generation, a little of this, a little of that.
The Treknologist: only interested in spaceships, tech, weapons, space travel, uniforms.
The Treknocrat: Likes the politics, the future Roddenberry world, the cautionary tales, the morality tales, actually likes Enterprise, and Scott Bakula
The Trekkultist: gets weird into speaking Klingon, or acting like a Vulcan.
The Trekster: digs the 60s, pointy sideburns, the oddness, likes the OS, doesn't know a whole lot about Star Trek, but watches it once and a while. Seen a few episodes of the other series. Seen a few of the movies.
Now...
No matter which one of these people you are, it still seems astonishing that any ONE of you could like the new Star Trek movie... The Supertrekker should be dismayed at the complete destruction of continuity, and the alteration of character...perhaps they picked up on all the little nods to various episodes and characters...but have got to be wondering why Scott Bakula's dog is still alive during Scotty's life...sorry fanboys, Dogs do NOT have longer lifespans even in Star Trek.
The Trekkian should also be upset, that the continuity is all messed up now, and wondering if they intend to remake the entire series, affecting every future episode which they know to be the past. Also, they have got to be wondering about the 'tone' and why it is nothing like Star Trek at all.
The Treklodyte is furiously pissed off, certainly about the actors portraying the 'new and improved and rewritten' Original cast, and about all the alterations of the Original Roddenberry future world. (That is if they even bothered to see a non-shatner film.)
The Trekonian is following the same path as the Treklodyte, but they wanted to see Kirk, Spock, etc, and they're probably wondering why the hell Spock is boinking Uhura, and how this has become 'the new timeline' just because some odd looking Romulans killed Kirk's Dad...why would this change Spock's life so he'd get it on with Uhura?
The Trekker must realize that this new Star Trek is nothing like those TV shows, and is missing a great deal of thought-provoking moments which lead to an 'ah-ha' somewhere toward the end of the movie. Instead, they get a loud and flashy action show with profanity and chicks in underwear...they are at least scratching their heads...
The Treknologist has got to be pissed off about the ENTERPRISE, where it was built, how it is designed, and why the engine room looks like an old boiler room with all kinds of 'see-through' pipes...not to mention the Bridge just seems like it belongs in Minority Report or something...
The Treknocrat should be ready to protest this film instantly, as it makes Starfleet Academy look like 90210, Kirk is a complete asshole reminiscent of "Dubya" or some jackass frat boy, who probably thinks Charles Dickens is an actor from "Murder She Wrote." There is nothing thought provoking about this film, and it makes Kirk a completely thoughtless asshole, both emotionally, and politically. Spock is nothing but a mere 'academic prick,' a snotty stuckup jerk who likes to boink humans, and there is way too much 'sadistic humor' to ever lead to any kind of 'humanist' value in the story.
The Trekkultist is preparing to kidnap and kill Leonard Nimoy, for even appearing in a film in which they blow up Vulcan, and make Romulans look like characters from a George Lucas film...the only thing missing was they didn't have double-bladed lightsabers, or medieval robes. None of the aliens spoke in their original languages, and all we see of Spock's childhood are impossibly 'thug-like' Vulcan children insulting him.
The Trekkster is wondering, why this film was even ever given the go-ahead, as it is essentially has the same lame-ass character plot as Starship Troopers. A bunch of pretty people join the "Federation," one joins because of some lame mentor character, and possibly to impress a girl, the girl is in love with a superior junior grade officer on the bridge, and the mentor-figure eventually ends up getting mangled, the main character has sex with the whore instead of the 'smart chick' who loves the 'prick' junior grade officer. They all run around behaving like immature assholes, blow some shit up, and save the day. Its a joke. Wampas, cute alien sidekicks, cocky space warriors, temporal nexus, bald bad aliens, hokey science, plotholes, punkass kids, sci-fi barfights, spacebattles with swords, seen it, done it, been there, what else is new? Waiting for Avatar...naw...looks like more of the same old crap...give us some Space 1999!
None of these people would seem to even begin to like this movie, unless there's just something in it that overshadows all the little details that they hold dear to their hearts...how could they like this movie? Do they really want to identify with punk-ass Kirkie? Do they really want to buy the DVD because they want to see Kirkie garb Uhura's tits over and over again? Did they hate the planet Vulcan that much? What could they possibly get out of this film? It was action-packed? It moved 'fast'? (So as to avoid a real plot.) I don't get it. The average non-Trek fan might like it, it has the usual mindlessness of any forgettable action flick of the last 10 years...Fast and Furious, the Transporter, Charlie's Angels...crass humor, underwear, wait...holy shit...
cutey people? Is that what this is all about? Shiny cutey pretty people? Are we this shallow these days now? They don't care how many scenes were stolen from Star Wars (a plagiarized work of mindlessness, but don't get me started on Lucas)? They don't care how illogical the science is, or how idiotic the story is? They don't care how utterly empty and pointless the villain is, and they just like the flashing lights, and silly giggly nonsense with Kirkie landing on Hoth, and running away from monsters...hehehehe...that's so funny. Wookit the cute little alien guy, oh Uhura's so hot, Kirkie's funny, Scotty's hilarious, its cool when Kirkie and Spocky kill that alien bald guy at the end...and that Chinese guy had a cool sword fight.
J.J. ABRAMS MADE STAR TREK FOR IDIOTS. He made it for the masses. He de-Star Trekked it, he eliminated everything 'intellectual' and 'thought provoking' and 'charming' and turned it into a flashy sexy music video... Everyone in the world should be thinking WTF while watching it, but since it has the added bonus of its own self-defining philosophy, that if you hate it, you're just a gay-assed nerd, or as Leonard Nimoy put it on SNL, "a dickhead." Because hell, Kirkie and Spocky would kick your ass if you don't like their movie, because it 'kicked ass.' Kick ass. They've turned Star Trek into a Steven Seagal movie. WTF?
So now, this is what it is about. Instead of intellectual Captains attempting to 'communicate' diplomatically with aliens onscreen, we'll get more 'make my day' shit in the future. It makes me ashamed to be American, as this is purely American-born style movie-making...I'm just suprised Uhura didn't shake her head, rattle her neck, and shake her ass, pointing at Spock, and say: "Oh noyoodon't honey." Why Kirk didn't say "Ima popa capin yo ass" was a missed opportunity. How about Scotty not paying attention to the dials and lights on his workstation while he 'reads' a Hustler with a naked Klingon on the cover...come on it would be good for a laugh... why not have Sulu go on some kind of Ninja mission with frail breastless chicks in miniskirts who are Federation 'Red-Shirt' ninjas with swords who do all kinds of karate and kick large men in the balls all the time? Come on, and Doctor McCoy should always be drinking out of his flask, 'cause its funny.
It is an utter disgrace as a movie. The complete and utter 'dumbing down' and too 'contemporary' for Star Trek... it is the equilvalent of making sure Luke Skywalker has an Ipod in the next installment of Star Wars, and that Han Solo has cartons of porno on the Millennium Falcon...as a joke.
This was the Robot-Chicken version of Star Trek, nothing less. If you're that kind of Beavis or Butthead...you'll love it, at least until you grow up and pull up your pants.
Kirk should really have some kick ass tattoes in the sequel, Uhura should definitely have some piercings all over with some nasty tattoes on her ass, and Spock should have a scene where he's in a sweatsuit gyrating to gangster rap, and Checkov should be caught playing videogames at his station, Sulu should be like all serious an into Ninja shit, and McCoy should like be doing his own drugs in sick bay and getting high and shit, and Kirk should always have a Bud in his hand. Yeah baby, thatzuhtImtalkinbout.
And that my friends is the NEW STAR TREK. How many times do I have to say it?
The New Star Trek does do one thing for the world: It defines who you are. If your immediate reaction was "It kicked ass." You probably have nothing more to say, because your vocabulary is severely limited, and so will be your lifespan.
If you hated this movie, it is because it goes against your very humanity...whether you were a 'Star Trek Fan' before you saw it or not. If you're a liberal, you're bound to hate it by your very principles, if you're a conservative, you should be bound to hate it by your very principles. If you're a complete and utter thoughtless moron, who was actually texting your friendz while watching the FILM, you probably loved it, and hopefully, you'll be the first to sign up for transporter experimentation when they invent it. Perhaps this film is actually a great idea in the end, perhaps it is a propaganda film to inspire these morons to TO GET THE HELL OFF OUR PLANET.
If Phil allows it i would like to respond to some of his fanboyness.......
Point 1 "....But they are lens flares in life"..... Looool. If you really see lens flares in real life there's something wrong with your eyes. Go visit a doctor or something.
Seriously. There's lens flares and there's LENS FLARES. Turning each scene into a christmas tree is not exactly a good exemple of realism.
Point 2 - Maybe it's a reboot but Nero still comes from the Prime Universe and romulans never looked like skinheads there.
Point 4 - A human with little grey's eyes isn't exactly off the norms to me. Besides all aliens made up for this movie are quite generic & lame. The deformed face between Uhura & Kirk at the bar, The one on the Kelvin's bridge & let's not forget the little raisin-face who following Scotty everywhere for no reason. Yes. They're a lot of fake looking aliens in the Prime Universe as well but they're actually contribute to the content of this universe, they deliver flesh over the bones. They're not just in the picture to give it a science-fiction touch.
Point 6 - 10 years old kids usually can't stand any cultural product older than 10 years so a 200 years old song even less.
Point 12 - Time travel gimmick is way overused and that was one of Trek's problems before Abrams rapes the franchise. Using a black hole like a time portal without suffering the consequance of its extreme gravity, now that's a new low in bad science. That black hole thing makes the Star Trek IV's slingshot time warp look like full of sense.
Point 13 - Aaaah the Shaky Cam. Another overused visual gimmick and not only in ST2009. That was even the main reason why the previous Abrams flick, Cloverfield, was barely watchable. Besides. They used shaky cams in the original series too, but only when the Enterprise was hit by an ennemy, not for each freaking non-action scenes.
Point 23 - As far as i remember Chekov/Koenig wasn't stereotypical & annoying like Chekov/Yelchin. Seriously they should let this character speak russian. Better to hear someone speaking clearly his own native language than trying to babbling in a broken english.
Point 24 - You said 2 words? let me saying 5: Star Trek, not Looney Tunes.
Point 26 - You know. Even in Halo they use drop pods to enter into a planet's athmosphere instead of just jumping from orbit.
Point 36 - StarFleet always built its ships in orbit. Especially for models not designed to fly into an athmosphere.
Point 39 - Kirk becomes an asshole Spock becomes 100% human McCoy becomes a sidekick Scotty becomes a Jar Jar Binks wannabe Uhura becomes a bimbo Sulu becomes a samurai Tchekov becomes a walking russian stereotype.
Need to say more?
Kirk was cooler with Shatner. Spock was deeper with Nimoy, etc...... Period.
Point 40 - We like baddies. Not one-dimensional over-cliched baddies. And i agree. Eric Bana done the best he could with the character they gave him.
In fact i like this Nero's line..... "James T. Kirk was a great man. That was another life." That sums perfectly the whole movie....
Point 41 - Yes. This movie copying Star Wars. Don't believe me? Go back to "A new hope" and note all the similarities.
Point 44 - See point 4
Point 50 - The Enterprise's supposed to be powered with antimatter not with coal & steam. Don't you think that would makes sense to set an antimatter chamber instead of a boiler room? This is suposed to be a XXIIIth century Starship, not some XIXth century steamboat. (Rolling eyes)
Point 59 - JJ. Abrams is indeed the most overrated movie guy in Hollywood since.....since......well since Quantin Tarantino and even the guy responsible for Kill Bill have way more talent than this four eyed ferengi. If ST2009 have been made by Michael Bay i'ld bet my pants the reviews wouldn't suck this movie's cock so hard.
Point 69 - Yes that scene is pathetic. But i suppose romulan miners can't say "Sorry to wasting your time Captain. We're definitively not in the good place to find what i'm looking for. So go back to your ship. We'll do our search somewhere else."
Point 78 - First: Star Trek is about morality. If you think this is annoying there's plenty of mindless action stuff out there to fill your brainless pleasures (Personally i've a weak spot for Hong Kong action style.). No need to put down a deep universe like ST on the Saturday morning cartoons level. What's next? Making a "The Fast & Furious" movie for people who don't like cars? Doing Heavy Metal for dudes who can't stand loud music? Come on....
Second: I wonder who are the trekkies now. People like me who lost their love for ST because of this movie or those people defending it like it was their girlfriend or their mom?
72. Why are they wading around in puddles on a Spaceship? because there is a great deal of moisture build up in the mining machinery. That's why.
hmm...
I don't recall this being explained in the film, then again, I didn't watch it ten times, I would have puked.
and to reveal the intelligence of this blogger: 65. Kirk grabs Uhura's boobs Dude, this was by accident. It was not harassment. two words. 'comic relief'. Your constant intention to paint Kirk as a pervert points to something deep within your own psyche I think.
Not my intention, J.J.Abrams intention...it was placed there in the film by Abrams very intentionally, to give little fanboy gushers the giggles, at the expense of the character...gee its funny to violate women isn't it? Hee hee...nothing like copping a feel, even if it is 'an accident' look at Kirkie's face afterwords...like a 13 year old who just discovered the word 'vagina.' Beavis and Butthead style humor...in Star Trek? It wasn't Dom Deluise who grabbed her tits, it was our 'hero' Kirk. This is disturbed. J.J. Abrams is confused about "Captain Kirk" and "Denny Crane." This is the origin story of "Denny Crane" not James T. Kirk, who never did shit like that in the show or the films. I never did shit like this either when I was young either... and what is the point of the scene, an 'accidental violation of a woman?' A joke of course, because this is Benny Hill, right? Maybe in Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Porkies, Scotty can look up chicks dresses, Checkov can spy on the women's shower onboard the enterprise, and Uhura's clothes can keep falling off because of Klingon electromagnetic rays. Got to keep the kiddies giggling about sex, after all this is STAR TREK, which inspired such important films as Zapped, Porkies and American Pie.
Star Trek TOS diehard signing in. The new Star Trek movie: Epic. Fucking. Fail. An abomination to all things holy in the Star Trek Universe. Alternate Timeline/Storyline, my ass. Overblown and trite, and nothing whatsoever to do with the real Star Trek storyline. Not to mention the entirely out of place advanced looking technology. "Oh, but the simplicity of Star Trek's original design wouldn't appeal to modern moviegoers unfamiliar to The Original Series." Hello? Maybe that was your first damn clue to leave well enough alone. The antithesis of Gene Rodenberry. J.J. Abrams should be ashamed of himself. As should Nimoy for being involved. I wanted to puke during the treacle-coated Kirk birth scene. And then The Beastie Boys playing during his wild adolescence? No matter my affection for them, The Beastie Boys do not belong in a Star Trek movie. "Sabotage", fucking indeed. And too damn cute with the green-skinned skank showing up. I'm surprised they didn't throw in a Tribble or three, too, for good measure. The slapstick allergic-reaction scene was embarrassing. And what's with the insignia-patterned uniforms? They look alternately like polka dots and waffle-textured long johns. And swirling streams of sperm in the transporter room? Huh? And what was with the tattooed Romulans? Good grief. And a doe-eyed, submissive Uhura getting it on with Spock? What. The. Fuck? NO.Simon Pegg as Scotty? Two words: Stunt Casting. Love him....but he was playing Simon, not Scotty! Sure, the "giving it all she's got Cap'n" reference was cute, but entirely expected. As was the guy in the red (shirt) suit getting it. Spock telling Kirk to get out of the chair was one genuinely humorous moment. Oh, and how could I forget Chekov....he looked NOTHING like him. What the hell was going on there? And Spock reciting the mission statement to conclude the film? Uh, NO. And then the final insult? Sitting in front of the screen, spent and perturbed, after enduring 2 hours of rubbish, only to be then treated to the emotion-inducing strains of the original theme music ingrained in my psyche from near infancy. How dare you, Mr. Abrams? How. Dare. You.
Star Trek (2009) is best summed up in a line of dialogue from the film, whereupon the elder Spock (Leonard Nimoy’s “Spock Prime”) admonishes his younger self (Zachary Quinto): “Let go of logic. Do what feels right.”
At the time of this writing, the onslaught of remakes, re-imaginings and “reboots” of classic films and television series continues unabated. Decedents of late include The Day the Earth Stood Still, Planet of the Apes, War of the Worlds, The Stepfather, V and Red Dawn. While the upcoming V re-imagining looks promising (no doubt due to the addition of Firefly’s Morena Baccarin and Alan Tudyk to the cast), remakes as the rule rather than the exception are symptomatic of the industry’s attempt to drain profit from every pocket and exploit every conceivable market demographic. Very few of these efforts are worthy of the mantles hijacked from popular culture that they attempt to drape about themselves. No amount of money or mainframes can make a Hollywood shitfeast taste any better, even if it sparkles rainbows. To belie the reader’s concern that the author harbors a general distaste for any form of remake in science fiction movies or television, a brief exploration in successful efforts thereof is necessary. In so doing, the author maintains that there exist at least two remakes, re-imaginings or reboots in science fiction film and television are superior to, yet simultaneously honor, the original story. Turn back to 1982’s The Thing a-la John Carpenter. A remake of the 1951 classic The Thing From Another World (featuring the beloved James Arness in the title role), Carpenter’s early signature style of characterization through paranoia (Assault on Precinct 13, Halloween) coupled with a veteran cast and as-yet unparalleled make-up effects by Rob Bottin comprised a thoroughly successful admixture in realizing a far more accurate portrayal of Joseph W. Campbell’s timeless novella Who Goes There? A quarter of a century on after breakthrough films like Tron and The Last Starfighter, plainly CGI still can’t hold a candle to The Thing. It would be difficult to find a more human scene than the departure of the unfortunate character Norris’ “head-spider” from the infirmary and Windows’ exasperated, “You gotta be fuckin’ kidding me?” It is ludicrous and horrible and overwhelming. And it never fails, after a dozen (or two dozen) viewings of The Thing. There are numerous other meaty scenes like this throughout the film; if anything, it is about consistency, and twenty-five years after its release, The Thing will consistently scare the hell out of you. The elements of geographic and physical isolation at the McMurdo Sound weather research station sets are equally tenable in both the original The Thing From Another World and Carpenter’s later effort, although the helicopter-based exterior shots in The Thing convey this isolation on a grander, even darker scale when paced with John Carpenter’s excellent score. And both films tellingly feature big explosions only at the climax of the story and the hopeful destruction of the monster, rather than constituting its entire momentum (more on this later). The post-Star Wars sci-fi frenzy spawned many clones and imitators in the late seventies and early eighties. Having moved from the exclusive realm of relatively harmless eccentrics, science fiction as a cultural phenomenon became, if for a time, as mainstream as disco. On occasion, they even merged (shudder). While enthusiasm for the genre generated a viable response at the box office for deserving films (ergo Alien, Blade Runner), standards inevitably fell as more product was being pumped out on a worldwide scale merely to accumulate profit (Starcrash, Battle Beyond the Stars), a condition that also afflicted westerns in the forties and fifties and which permeates the movie-going experience at present. While admittedly, the author is guilty of having most of these clones, imitators, and hundreds of other space operas and b-westerns in his personal collection, it should be noted that some of these films are not without merit. Hopefully, the same can one day be said for late twentieth and early twenty-first century remakes, re-imaginings and reboots. Star Trek (2009) will not be among these. Into the maelstrom of the late seventies sci-fi craze came television mainstay Glenn Larson’s Battlestar Galactica (1978). Citing a score of imagined similarities and adversely reacting to a possible threat to Star Wars as godhead of the science fiction market (save for the final frontier of television), Twentieth Century Fox ensnared Universal’s Battlestar Galactica into a vicious and rather costly cycle of copyright infringement litigation that was not resolved until after the demise of Galactica 1980, the bizarre, Wolfman Jack-infused and horrendously awful bookend to Battlestar Galactica, both of which perished after just barely one season. Twentieth Century Fox’s claims were finally thrown out of court altogether, but not without affecting the overall production of Battlestar Galactica in terms of dwindling finances relative to the duration of the lawsuit. A product of the sci-fi disco zeitgeist, Larson’s original featured a likeable if otherwise two-dimensional cast, superb interior sets, and gratuitous space battles galore, stock footage of which was used repeatedly, ad nauseaum, until the last episode of the bastardized Galactica 1980. Some of this footage even found its way into a handful of fly-by-night science fiction films, most of which were produced outside of the United States. [A similar fate is manifest in the myriad films making ample use of stock footage from Roger Corman’s Battle Beyond the Stars well into the 1990s.] Lorne Greene’s familiar, warm voiceover concluded every original episode with, “Fleeing the Cylon tyranny, the last Battlestar, Galactica, leads a ragtag fugitive fleet on a lonely quest: a shining planet, known as Earth.” Stirring stuff, harkening back to Wagon Train and even Gene Roddenberry’s earliest musings on what would eventually become (with the timely input of lodestone production designer Matt Jeffries) Star Trek. While the package looked promising, the delivery was not. Battlestar Galactica in 1978 suffered from abysmal writing and plot holes one could comfortably fly a Cylon Basestar through. It was a typical, if flashy, product of seventies television- continuity was a barely existent concept as implemented, story arcs were (outside of a miniseries) altogether unknown, and the convention of hero-saves-the-day-just-before-the-last-commercial-break ruled without peer. That being said, the author still reserves a special place in his heart for the original inception of Battlestar Galactica. This conceit would initially produce a profound revulsion at its re-imagining some twenty-five years later. Having rejected the superb Star Trek writer Ronald D. Moore’s repeated promises to honor the 1978 series, the author proudly closed ranks with Richard Hatch, et al in vociferous condemnation of Battlestar Galactica’s 2003 “reboot”. Dubbed “GINO”, or “Galactica In Name Only” by Richard Hatch, a rift that to some extent still remains polarized the entire generation of Galactica fandom. GINO was anathema to the author, who promptly dug out the old tapes again to watch the original run, albeit this time in silent protest. This revulsion had nothing at all to do with the character of Starbuck being portrayed by a female, as some fans (and alas, Dirk Benedict) pointlessly ranted on about; still smarting years after the disastrous Lost In Space (1998) and The Avengers (1998) remakes, some things simply had to be regarded as sacrosanct. One night while channel-hopping between The Sci-Fi Network (read: “Syfy” and the continued dumbing-down of the human species) and Encore Westerns, the author began idly watching a program about some people who were trapped on a spaceliner fleeing some sort of holocaust. To the consternation of the other passengers, one fellow maintained a panicky dialogue with his imaginary lover. This seemed like something out of The Twilight Zone, really engaging stuff. Then someone said the word: “Cylon.” Not only was the author watching the dreaded GINO, but by the commercial break a moment later he was absolutely hooked. After the conclusion of that first episode of the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica, “33”, he immediately went out and bought the miniseries dvd. This remade, re-imagined, rebooted Battlestar Galactica was the best damned show he had seen since Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Even Richard Hatch crossed the picket lines and became a regular on the cast, finally allowed to really act. The Machiavellian character of Tom Zarek is miles above the old cutout Apollo. Edward James Olmos as Adama; it may be a good thing that poor old Lorne Greene did not live to see himself be so outdone. Katee Sackhoff. Mary McDonnel. James Callis. Michael Hogan. Aaron Douglas. [Just watch the frakkin’ show already.] In the hands of Ronald D. Moore and David Eicke, a pall of claustrophobic darkness akin to Alien swept over the rag-tag fugitive fleet. A brilliant premise was finally coupled with gifted writing and superior production style. Like Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and later Star Trek: Enterprise, the binding strength of the show was being character-driven at its core as these poor bastards, Cylon and human alike, struggled with The Big Questions (more on this later) in a consistently fundamental manner for four mind-blowing seasons. Every character is a twitching bundle of vulnerabilities and passions, altogether so human and frail and real. In the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica, even the space battles suck. A lot of people (including many of your favorite cast regulars) die, in violence and cold and silence. All the childhood romance is gone, sucked into the Big Empty to drift dead forever. It is truly horrible to contemplate, and this is what separates good science fiction from the mere space opera of the original 1978 incarnation. The revolutionary style of “space battle perspective” pioneered in Battlestar Galactica would later be shamelessly aped without grace throughout Star Trek (2009). For the sake of brevity, it should simply be stated that Battlestar Galactica (and perhaps Firefly, though FOX strangled it while still in the cradle) will remain, for many years to come, the standard by which science fiction television is measured for storytelling greatness. In this remarkable program, the lesson learned is that pretty much all of the time, the “bad guys” win, and they are far more like us than we have the strength to admit. (In a notable irony, at the time of this writing Ronald D. Moore is at work on another reboot of The Thing.)
“Let go of logic. Do what feels right.”
The original Star Trek series, for all its perceived kitsch, was always about The Big Questions (even in “Spock’s Brain” and “The Paradise Syndrome”): What makes us all human? What is our place in the cosmos? From Plato to Kant to Wells to Clarke, The Big Questions have driven the human experience ever forward and (tentatively) into space. In the words of Russian rocket pioneer Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, "Earth is the cradle of humanity, but one cannot live in the cradle forever." For nearly half a century, Star Trek has been the cultural vehicle through which millions of people around the world have vicariously explored our collective similitude and ultimate destiny of reaching outward to the stars. Although many of the essential components are in place, The Big Questions are what makes the Star Trek phenomenon difficult to classify (or even dismiss) as mere space opera, unlike the long-running Perry Rhodan print series, Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, and yes, the Star Wars saga. It is perhaps because of its longstanding place in our cultural parlance that made Star Trek vulnerable to what amounts as a hostile takeover by bad people with worse ideas. In the closing days of the Las Vegas Hilton’s Star Trek: The Experience, a promo reel for Star Trek (2009) was run on the largest screen above the exhibit’s DS9 Promenade mockup. Notwithstanding the rather silly dramatic license of a Constitution-class starship being constructed planetside from where it could never lift off, there was a tangible excitement in the air. A story going back to the original five-year mission was just what the fans needed after the untimely demise of Star Trek: Enterprise in 2005. Unlike some Trek purists, the author was looking forward to a new, effective cast and a good story. The truly excellent online fan-made series licensed by Paramount, Star Trek: Phase II, was a hopeful glimmer of what a large studio could accomplish with the vast Trek community of fans, writers and production crew. Sadly, Paramount absconded with its holdings and left every one of them behind in the production of the new film. No Rick Berman, Ronald D. Moore, nor Ira Steven Behr. Not one member of the thousands-strong franchise production community, which kept it all going on planet Earth for nearly half a century and a decade after Gene Roddenberry’s death, was to be part of “Star Trek XI”. A new administration of suits at Paramount ushered in hotshot know-nothings and self-declared Trek haters J.J. Abrams, Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman to re-make, re-model and “reboot” Star Trek. Between them, these men are the ones that brought us such unforgettable film gems as The Legend of Zorro, Mission: Impossible III, Transformers, and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. With such combined stellar filmmaking credentials, storytelling expertise and exclusive power to determine the future of a global cultural phenomenon like Star Trek, surely nothing could go wrong with a makeover (“Let go of logic. Do what feels right.”). While a more comprehensive list of its failings are beyond the scope of this essay, it can be said with assurance that Star Trek (2009) is henceforth known as STINO (“Star Trek In Name Only”) for the remainder thereof. Let it be understood that the author does not preach a Luddite approach to Star Trek, whereupon any thing new is inherently wrong or automatically awful. Enterprise is the best example of a recent, even revolutionary change in Star Trek that just happened to be one of its finest incarnations. “In a Mirror, Darkly” is arguably the best episode of Star Trek ever, right up there with “Specter of the Gun”, “In The Pale Moonlight”, “The Inner Light” and “Scorpion”. Never once in its 127 minutes does STINO attempt to address the concerns that have been at the center of Star Trek (even the animated series!) since the production of “The Cage” back in 1965. Cobbled together from a Frankenstein’s abattoir of plot devices and production techniques brazenly lifted from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Battlestar Galactica and Firefly, Messieurs Abrams, Orci and Kurzman plead their case with tiresome, thoroughly nauseating winks to the actual franchise throughout. This is highly reminiscent of the disaster that was Die Another Day to James Bond; however, there is no Daniel Craig to save us from STINO, unless he is somehow cast as Kirk in the inevitable sequels. In lieu of our beloved characters from the original five-year mission, we are treated to Disneyfied caricatures, child supermodels staggering around under the weight of their own petty, inflated egos. In the Star Trek: Phase II series, Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scotty, Sulu, Chekov and Uhura are all played by fans, folks referred to as “amateurs” by any other name. These “amateurs” are not merely channeling Shatner, Nimoy, Dee Kelly et al – there is a tangible love for the character that shines through every one of their performances (for which, it is worthy of note, they volunteer their time). In STINO, there is simply no love for the characters which have become mainstays of popular culture over a lifetime. In a famed Star Trek skit in the earliest years of Saturday Night Live, the over-the-top performances of John Belushi, Chevy Chase, and Dan Ankroyd as Kirk, Spock and McCoy respectively were far more convincing. Particularly disappointing were the performances of Simon Pegg and John Cho, two actors with whom the author had placed the most faith prior to seeing the film. Perhaps if more screen time had been allotted to Karl Urban’s McCoy, STINO would have been a touch more tolerable at times. Not even the appearance of Leonard Nimoy as “Spock Prime” lends a waft of legitimacy to the film, as some fans have maintained. By that same reasoning, should T.J. Hooker be similarly lauded merely because William Shatner was in the title role? After 127 minutes, the viewer is no closer to finding what makes us all human, and still has no clue as to what our place is in the cosmos. The answer for both is apparently Big Explosions, which leads us to the actual main character of STINO. Big Explosions has more screen time than any other character. There are shiny, many-tiered ones. There are sparkly booming ones and huge, blinding supernova ones - in fact there are quite many of the latter. The aesthetic arrangement of Big Explosions retains center-stage throughout the film, and as such has the most character development. The author wishes he could elaborate a more on the growth of Kirk and Spock – it was sad that Kirk was made an orphan. It was a bummer when Spock’s mom died. That homeless band of RightSaidFred Romulans was some bad people that hated everybody. But Big Explosions captured our hearts in STINO, and subsequently all of our oohs and aahs, from the opening scenes to the credit sequence. Surely, Big Explosions will feature in the sequels. A particularly irksome feature of STINO that deserves mention was the blatant product placement. Notwithstanding the fact that capitalism doesn’t exist in Star Trek (except maybe within the Ferengi Alliance, or wherever enterprising Ferengi roam), the overt commercialism throughout seriously undercut an already laughable attempt at Star Trek credibility (imagine if you will William Shatner hawking “Hai Karate” dressed as Kirk). This was particularly manifest in the design of the bridge, which seemed to have been built on the sales floor of a Bath & Bodyworks outlet, brazenly lit in a manner that could easily send a feline into seizures. The iconic turbolift itself was completely indistinguishable from everything else – how did our caricatures ever find the door? Outside of the bridge (or the equally atrocious transporter room), the entire ship’s interior was reminiscent of a sewage treatment facility circa classic Doctor Who. It would indeed take a TARDIS to accommodate these selfsame cavernous interiors on a ship that (traditionally) accommodates some four hundred crewmembers. The attempt at the “lived-in” look (via such innovators as Dark Star, Silent Running, Alien, and Star Wars) is thus carelessly amateur in execution. Star Trek spaceship sets, even the Klingon and Romulan ones, are primarily about functionality, just like real naval and commercial vessels. Matt Jeffries and his worthy successors maintained this throughout every Star Trek production in order to maintain a strong sense of realism for the viewer, a formula that worked for nearly half a century. There actually was a sewage treatment and recycling vessel on Battlestar Galactica featured in a number of episodes, and throughout it looked like a functional ship. Props to Matt Jeffries. Another painful aspect of STINO is the total abandonment of ship’s protocol, namely the chain-of-command. On any vessel of any configuration, this is the most critical element of operations, even on the Space Shuttle. Star Trek rigorously employed this fact of life throughout in order to maintain that vital sense of realism. It does not take a regular contributor to Jane’s Defense Weekly to grasp an elementary understanding of this. However, the Abrams-Orzi-Kurzman cabal did away with such a nuisance in STINO. You too can be captain, just by sitting in the chair. And why have anyone tell you differently? After all, George W. Bush did it for eight years. The same self-absorbed, know-nothing spirit abounds throughout the film, a complete affront to an institution of good science fiction and a lifetime of profound creative endeavor by a community of thousands which was abandoned in the process of its manufacture (emphasis on the last word). The greatest shock of this “rebooted” Star Trek franchise comes in the form of an exchange between the new-and-improved Kirk and Spock on the sales floor of Bath & Bodyworks: the notion of clemency to the marauding homoerotic Romulans trapped on their dying ship/collection of random metal objects-de-art is abandoned on the spot. Kirk and Spock can barely contain their giggles at the prospect of totally annihilating a fallen enemy. The message is the same as on talk radio and television news: revenge is good for you, even scrumptious. In fact, revenge fucking rocks, dude! This scene is without compare the most antonymic one in STINO as opposed to actual Star Trek. It would be appropriate to cite this total contradiction in theme with that of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan and Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, considering all of the plot devices blatantly ripped from them and morphed onto STINO by the Borg-like corporate cabal that made the latter. In both films, revenge is obviously a central theme and (like the oft-quoted Moby Dick throughout) results in the undoing of the lives of all the characters involved. It is epic tragedy, not a football game or a fraternity beer pong mixer. Revenge is destructive to everyone, and ultimately self-destructive. This has been a consistent theme in Star Trek since the original series, which in STINO most assuredly it is not. In Star Trek II and Star Trek III, revenge is altogether karmic in its envelopment: in Khan’s obsession to destroy Kirk, he destroys all of his own people. The Genesis Device, the erstwhile instrument of Khan’s vengeance, upends the entire Mutura Sector. The shaky peace with the Klingon Empire nearly unravels, no thanks to the ambitious Lord Kruge. The captains and crews of both the Reliant and Grissom meet grisly fates. Scotty’s nephew is killed, Kirk’s own son is murdered, and of course there is the death of Spock. These are but two sweeping examples of Star Trek’s traditional abhorrence for any notion of revenge. There are many dozens, if not hundreds, more in the television shows as well. Where STINO departs, with a smug grin, from one of Star Trek’s most crucial themes is revealing of its ugliest aspect. To further illustrate, the following exchange from Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country reveals how Kirk’s own prejudices nearly become his own undoing:
Kirk: “They’re animals!" Spock: "Jim, there is a historic opportunity here." Kirk: “Don’t believe them! Don’t trust them!” Spock: "They are dying.” Kirk: “Let them die.” Spock: “There is an old Vulcan proverb: ‘Only Nixon could go to China’.”
A stint on the frozen penal colony of Rura Penthe notwithstanding, Kirk realizes it is himself who is an obstacle to peace with the Klingon Empire. He must change and overcome his grief at the death of his son, and his resultant hatred of the Klingon people, to make the galaxy a peaceful place for everyone. We are afforded no such introspective developments with the “rebooted” Kirk, nor any other character in STINO whatsoever. In the rebooted “alternate universe” or whatever where we now find ourselves, the Klingons would have most certainly been better off dead. Perhaps this is already a sequel pitch? Under the (mis)guidance of the Abrams-Orzi-Kurzman cabal, STINO’s storyline officially now dispenses with all that follows in Star Trek, a slap in the face to the creative effort of thousands of writers and production crew. Gone are all the adventures of the original five-year mission, and as such the literal unraveling of The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager, Enterprise, to say nothing of the feature films. It is not a tiresome matter of what is “canon” and what is not, but of good storytelling and endeavoring to bring us all closer to finding those troublesome answers to The Big Questions. The work of many lifetimes amounts to so much carrion for the corporate jackals in question to rip pieces from in their quest to fool the public into giving them its money. It is difficult to fathom how a franchise could be considered “ailing” with millions around the world continuing to throw their money at Paramount, et al for decades on end, with mass conventions with an average attendance of tens of thousands in any major city around the world in every week of the calendar year. Truly, the Las Vegas Hilton rues the day it stunningly refused to renew the lease of Star Trek: The Experience after ten hugely successful years of standing-room only crowds of fans in their annual hundreds of thousands. [At the time of this writing, its imminent return to Las Vegas’ Neonopolis Mall in 2010 is indeed a harsh lesson learned for the cash-strapped Hilton hotel chain.] Rather than attempting to “revitalize” the Star Trek franchise, STINO merely repackages it in a sickly, shiny manner and waters it down beyond all recognition. STINO is the Zima to Roddenberry’s Guinness. We are witness to a shell game played with millions of dollars- just as Carrot Top is not comedy and Fox is not news, so too is STINO most definitely not Star Trek. Regardless of the upcoming five-picture contract between “Jar Jar” Abrams and Paramount, there is still plenty of Star Trek out there for the otherwise deprived fan. Star Trek: Phase II is worthy in every way of being called “Season Four” of the original series. In addition, the recent independent release Star Trek: Of Gods and Men features an encompassing array of cast members and guest stars from the movies and every television series. Both Star Trek: Of Gods and Men and Star Trek: Phase II feature stories written and produced by long-serving Trek crew, some of whom wrote for and worked on the original series itself. These accomplishments did not even require the GDP of your garden-variety Balkan state to produce and market, either. Making good Trek is a herculean labor involving many people, but most of all it takes love – love of Trek’s uncompromising vision and the compelling questions it asks of us, and love of a good story. Unlike much of the television and movie chaff, Star Trek has always required a certain level of intellectual and emotional engagement, and a thing that was called willing suspension of disbelief, which nowadays we (un)consciously apply to television news. And on the rare occasion that the writing or production is subpar, a little forbearance may be necessary. For the record, a double-header of “Spock’s Brain” and “The Lights of Zetar” beats the hell out of just staring at pretty lights and a hackneyed collection of big explosions (this time minus good old Carl Sagan) for two hours plus. The power of the Internet means that there are actually good fan flicks out there. Who could possibly argue that the entire Star Wars prequel series was better or more convincing than the excellent installment known as TROOPS? The mere ten minutes of this fan film is vastly superior to the grueling, mind-numbing seven hours of prequels, and far more worthy of the Star Wars mantle. “Let go of logic. Do what feels right,” was surely the rationale behind the disastrous Star Wars prequels. In a like fashion, the number of Star Trek fan films and even whole independent series are increasing as moviemaking technology and distribution acquire ever more off-the-shelf characteristics. Millions of fans will inevitably continue to make Trek that is superior to STINO for years to come. Star Trek will definitely live on, albeit in a guerrilla fashion, a virtual people’s war against its usurpers. Thirty years ago, there was no Star Trek on television. But with equal parts networking and ground-pounding on the part of the fans, the feature films and Star Trek: The Next Generation kept Trek flying. Never, never doubt the dedication of Trekkers. There are millions of them around the world, many of them quite disgusted with STINO. On to people’s war! Based on the criteria presented, STINO is in every possible manner unworthy of the Star Trek mantle. Not only did the film avoid The Big Questions altogether, but in lieu of a story, the viewer is required to withstand a 127 minute lights show without benefit of a mandatory dose of strong hallucinogens with which to enjoy the ride. Star Trek V: The Final Frontier and Star Trek: Insurrection, though admittedly ham-fisted in their storytelling capability (and certainly not the best of Trek by far), remain superior films to STINO not because they are “canon”, “real universe”, or some such contrived argument for validity or recognition. The Final Frontier and Insurrection (directed by William Shatner and Jonathan Frakes, respectively) are better Star Trek movies because their stories are far more coherent and engaging than STINO, if a bit garbled in their execution. These are characters and to a degree, situations that we care about. Even Shatner’s ego benefits his character, rather than being the character itself as in Chris Pine’s Kirk. Ergo,“Why does God need a spaceship?” And F. Murray Abraham is far more menacing in Amadeus than Eric Bana’s boytoy STINO Romulan. In these dark days of the early twenty-first century, the author is happy to continue watching the feature films and series on dvd. There is also the upcoming premier of the latest installment of Star Trek: Phase II entitled “Blood and Fire, Part 2”, written by longtime Star Trek contributor David Gerrold (“The Trouble With Tribbles”), made and performed by everyday fans purely out of love. STINO was obviously hacked out in a closed room of suits devising ever more insidious ways to hawk their shiny wares and expand their stock portfolios. All the while, as the remakes, re-imaginings and reboots proceed with more green lights and capital investment than the deck of an aircraft carrier, the suits continue to gouge away the expectations of the movie-going public until we are all reduced to the hopelessly self-absorbed consumer chattel of Idiocracy.
- The preceding essay is my personal broadside fired in defense of all that is Star Trek. While it was my intention to veer wide from an anti-Star Trek (2009) polemic, I cannot help but write defending an integral part of my life. Like millions of other people, my second home has always been the bridge or engineering deck of a Federation starship. While I do not pretend to aspire to the role of film critic, in the realm of Star Trek and the genre of science fiction I have a lifetime of knowledge to draw upon. Some of my earliest memories are watching the original and animated series in syndication on the local UHF networks. My first Happy Meal was from Star Trek: The Motion Picture. Hell, those were the first Happy Meals ever. In retrospect, the feature films and series which followed mark different phases of my life. I have been very fortunate to have had the opportunity to meet and spend time talking with many members of the cast and crew. You would not believe my mad Trek street cred if I even told you half of it. Having been such a huge part of my life, Star Trek has become something inseparable, very personal and treasured. There are pictures of my wife and me on two different bridge sets. While she insisted that we not have a Star Trek wedding (I believe it sounded something like, “No fucking way.”), you can bet your gold-pressed latinum that when Star Trek: The Experience re-opens in Las Vegas we’re renewing our vows in costume. Did I mention that I am a proud owner of a “monster maroon”? [For the record, my wife is a fan by proxy; she maintains that she knew what she was getting into when we first started dating and I could no longer conceal my fandom as we got to know each other better. Her take on STINO: “This isn’t Star Trek.” Life is good - even Trekkers can get the girl!] While I personally reject the drawing of a proverbial line in the sand, I do maintain that Star Trek (2009) is Star-Trek-In-Name-Only. It was so awful I had to watch it twice just to wrap my head around how much it completely sucked, both as a Star Trek movie and as a science fiction movie. The abomination that was Lost in Space (1998) is better by virtue of the fact that it at least has Gary Oldman in it. The burden of proof now rests with Mr. Abrams, et al if they can redeem storytelling with the (inevitable) future sequels and create a Star Trek movie worthy of the name. Perhaps we will see the development of a dynamic not unlike The Motion Picture versus The Wrath of Khan? In the meantime, rather than subject myself or my loved ones to STINO, I will pop in the dvd for Star Trek V: The Final Frontier or Star Trek: Insurrection. Stone sober, even. And rest my beverage on the STINO disk, which is all that it’s good for now. Finally, to the attention of Messieurs Abrams, Orci and Kurzman: there no such things as Klingon warbirds!
A lot of film and television series' go through changes. One of the ultimate problems or situations is that of 'continuity.'
Changes that occur may involve redesign of costumes and vehicles, spaceships and weapons, as well as any number of what might seem insignificant things...
Time passes, 'real world' technology advances, and trends come and go.
There are film and television series' still with us from the 1960s...shows that have attempted to continue straight on, and re-develope themselves over and over. From Star Trek to Doctor Who, to Mission Impossible to Planet of the Apes.
From the 60s, to the 70s, to the 80s, to the 90s, to NOW, all sorts of re-fitting has gone on with all kinds of shows, from remakes, to reboots, to prequels and endless sequels...and with that there are possibilities to "ALTER" what once went before. Some alterations are nothing but the introduction of bellbottoms and butterfly collars, to their removal... redesigns of things for reasons such as improving technology, to simply allowing a new filmmaker to do what he wants with the series. Ultimately the question is, how much does all this effect the story, and the characters? Does it effect them?
Is the "New and Improved" Star Trek even the same universe within its series? Is it even concievable that it may or not be, but it has altered the central view of what the series originally implied?
They aren't wearing bellbottoms, or butterfly collars, and it seems 60s velour shirts have been replaced with nylon polyester jerseys, and yet the mini-skirt is still there... the technology has undergone dramatic changes, at least in surface appearance...everything is made of white polished and transparent plastic...the phasers fire like rapid fire automatic weapons (which seems pointless, shooting holes in metal with an energy beam that fires once every second, to 50 times a second...what's the difference...oh the other is more dramatic.)
Our 'real world' technology and clothing styles seem to be the overwhelming influence to 'change' a show...the story presented, while changing characters and story, is nothing new. They call it 'an update.'
Battlestar Galactica changed virtually everything about the show in its 'remake' effort. From uniforms to robots, to ships, to characters, basically carrying on the skeleton plot about space travellers looking for their home planet...but for some reason people liked that.
How much has this year's remake of Star Trek has changed Star Trek? Is it even the same world that Zefram Cochrane came from?
The answer is no, and even before they fucked around with continuity via time travel and timelines. Never before were their 'brand names' in the future, at least on Earth, in the Federation...sure there were brand names when the crew time travelled to the past, but there were no brand names, not even in ENTERPRISE. Some other form of culture is present in the Star Trek remake. A culture that only seems similar to the temporary and fickle present day...2007--2009... Where young people at least on television behave a certain way... From Ipods to cellphones and currently trendy alcoholic beverages... these are the bellbottoms and butterfly collars...however... this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to 'altering' the culture in star trek. Now it is suggested that it match up with current culture, as far as we have 'progressed.' In the original, women have officer's positions, black women, on the bridge, an unheard of cultural situation previously, meant to illustrate the 'progressive' cultural situation in the future...Russians work together with Americans...asians...etc. The very idea was to look ahead to what cultural situations would be not only progressive, but different...not to 'match up' with 'today's standards.'
If the original Star Trek was supposed to 'match up' with 'present day' cultural standards of the 1960s, Uhura would have been the ship's cook or maid, Sulu would have been the ship's tailor or outfitter, or drudging it in the engine-room covered in soot and grease... Chekov would have been a spy on board, and there would have been a Christian minister aboard the Enterprise...
The very idea at its core, whether one agrees with its politics or not, was to look ahead to the future, a 'future culture' which goes beyond our own.
In the new Star Trek young people are not more responsible, not more studious, not more intelligent...they still cackle and make asses of themselves in bars, (because of course even all of us do that even today)...and every scene inside a bar must include a fight... young men still behave like crass perverted jerks to women, and women (as current trends go) are funny and hip when they are crass and tell perverted jokes ("have sex with farm animals")... yes because in the 'future' people are ultimate more crass, and less intelligent... and Vulcans are nothing but above average humans with above average intelligence, which is why they appears so ODD to humans... The so-called 'future' of the new Star Trek is based soley on TECHNOLOGY. There is barely any idea of what kind of government they have, and who is in power, although it is assumed that it must be the same as in previous Star Trek incarnations.
It would appear that the only thing interesting going on in this future world, and what makes it different from our current world, is that human beings somehow have made space travel a conventional thing, although militaristic, most specifically. Basically Cosmic Aircraft carriers take off from Earth and look for inhabited worlds, to either do battle with them, or make deals for resources... Still somewhat the same as old Trek...and in this capacity...what is so new, other than they've altered the cultural standards of the times and refashioned characters and totally distorted timelines in order to write whatever story they wanted to?
We get no further insight into the world of star trek, its universe, and since the characters have been dramatically altered, they are essentially brand new characters we haven't seen before, and the only reasons they give us to care about them is that they happen to have the same names as characters we ARE familiar with...
As much as this film tried to be like star wars in its structure and pacing, the original Star Wars movie had some insight into what kind of world those people lived in... some sort of Martial Law, a rebellion, some religious views, some info on the past, what it was like, and characters who were all responding to such conditions in their lives before the events and during the events in the movie...
In Star Trek, all we see is that there were some aliens who got pissed off about their planet dying, and they're pissed, they killed some people, they want to kill more people... Starfleet didn't bother to investigate after they blew up one of their space ships... too busy doing whatever it is they are doing whatever that is, because they never really tell us, and based on how different their society is in this new movie, why should I assume it is the same as Old Trek? After all they do tell us that Starfleet are the military 'peacekeepers' of the Galaxy... ahh...that's quite different than before... but that doesn't give us much else to go on, other than these characters are nothing but futuristic naval cadets...something identical to Starship Troopers...
Starship Troopers went to task trying to elaborate on the kind of world these characters lived in, no matter how bad the movie ended up...
The new Star Trek does not tell us what kind of world this 'future' it takes place in is like because in reality it is telling us, IT IS THE SAME CRAPPY WORLD YOU LIVE IN NOW, ONLY WITH BETTER TECHNOLOGY.
And my response to this is...who cares? Why would I be interested in that?
Now, I realize that their 'bragging' about how 'realistic' this movie is, in that the above statement is supposed to be telling me how smart they are in basically making a 'futuristic now' but it tells me they have no common sense. The world today is nothing like it was even 10 years ago.
12 years ago, not everyone had cell phones, one could go to the airport without being harrassed by gestapo thugs, one wasn't criminalized for not having health insurance, and there wasn't this 'societal' concern regarding 'pandemics' where the government considers everyone part of some 'collective' by which they feel they can mandate such things as mandatory vaccinations and other bizarre issues. Life is certainly changing, better or worse, it won't be the same in five years, and culture will also respond to these changes. 2004-2009 might have been a time of twittering twits who think nothing of texting their friends and drinking as much as possible, Britney Spears, Paris Hilton and watching "Lost" and "American Idol," but I assure you that is all about to change.
Star Trek XI is nothing but a fantasy snapshot of 2008. Some kind of delusional mirror image culturally of the lowest common denominator, which is 'dressed up like Star Trek' and that's about it.
Episodes of the original Series will still speak to us, the same way Rod Serling did in Twilight Zone...beyond the cultural trash, on the other side of things, somewhere in the zone which the best authors and storytellers can stand and view things...they're not just holding up a mirror of what we look like now, they're telling us what we can be, warning us about what we could become, and what might befall us. Star Trek XI tells us absolutely nothing, except, perhaps, 'this is how shallow our target audience is, the people we want to make money off of, and this is how we portray them so we can make them feel good about the Future we are going to sell them.'
Star Trek XI is not just a bad movie with a bad plot, with bad characters, annoying effects, and dumb jokes....ITS SICK.
"In many ways a sequel will have a very different mission. It needs to do what [Gene] Roddenberry did so well, which is allegory," says Abrams.
Yeah? Why the hell didn't you do that in the first place?
"It needs to tell a story that has connection to what is familiar and what is relevant. It also needs to tell it in a spectacular way that hides the machinery and in a primarily entertaining and hopefully moving story. There needs to be relevance, yes, and that doesn't mean it should be pretentious."
So what you're saying is your First Star Trek remake sucked? That is was irrelevant and mindless and pretentious?
Orci echoed Abrams, noting that it had been one of the biggest criticisms of the new Trek. "One of the things we heard was, 'Make sure the next one deals with modern-day issues.' We're trying to keep it as up-to-date and as reflective of what's going on today as possible. So that's one thing, to make it reflect the things that we are all dealing with today." When asked if "modern day issues" meant war, terrorism, and torture, Orci agreed that was "an approach" they were taking.
The quotes have caused quite a discussion in the movie news-o-sphere to a mixed response. Many feel that the films should reflect the original 1960s series and hint at social issues. Others feel that such blatant allegory can make a film feel very dated in a few short years, and want Trek to just stick to telling good adventure stories. After all, taking a political stance stands to alienate many moviegoers, though controversy is always welcome from a publicity point of view.
Which is why Star Trek IV: Saved the Whales did so well? This is idiotic...people loved that movie and still do.
Star Trek is definitely heading into problematic waters. Sci-fi has always been at its best when it reflected the modern world, but it is such a fine line to tread because you don't want your sci-fi epic to be full of thinly disguised Communists when the geopolitical climate changes. While I think issues of pre-emptive strikes, war, and torture might be general enough to be forever relevant, I worry that trying to tackle them will just be clumsy. It already feels dated in some ways, and it's difficult to imagine Starfleet saying anything new on the subject. If Star Trek is going to tackle something I hope they go gentle, and tackle prejudice through Spock and Uhura's relationship. There's some racial and gender issues there just waiting to be mined for a background story.
So screw the real world, let's focus on how Checkov is gay, and whether Uhura can have sex with Spock...typical...
Dear Mr. Sternwise, Don't know if you caught this. We featured it on AsininePoetry.com about a month or two back. Would have told you sooner but I just found your great site today. All best, Richie Narvaez http://www.asininepoetry.com/hopin/1258
DON'T BET YOUR QUATLOOS: 11 HAIKUS ABOUT THE NEW STAR TREK MOVIE by Gordon Stanley
CLASSIC Trek: '60s ideals New Trek: Budweiser and Nokia ads
The future shines Brightly lit plastic white The future is Sephora
Red Matter must've been used while writing the script Note all the big holes
Say Spock stops the supernova Romulus lives -- but without its sun?
Spock maroons Kirk (on Hoth) right where Old Spock and Scotty happen to be.
Here you can sumbit any article criticizing Star Trek freely without being viciously attacked. Insulting comments are always deleted...Submit your videos, articles, links, cartoons, pics, essays, bitches, rants and analysis of the new Star Trek XI film. All your opinions matter, and show the world what is it you hate about this NEW Star Trek, because we're not going to go away, nor stand for it. Make your opinions known to the world. This blog is increasing in pages views every day. Make your statement, make your stand, email philsternwise @ yahoo. com
