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seldneiI joke that I was born a Star Trek fan like a lot of people are born Catholic. There was no choice involved: my mother was a Star Trek fan, loved the original series (that was all there was at the time), read all the books, watched the re-runs, could tell you what episode was on within three minutes even when she was in another room and just heard the dialogue ... Kirk and Spock and McCoy were basically part of my life from the start.
So I watched all the re-runs, read some of the books (Spock's World was a good one, and there was this collection of essays that I remember because it had one, written at the time of the show, discussing Spock's "surprising" sex appeal), saw the movies when they came out (the first one? Boring. Second one? Awesome. Particularly when Mom, on the way out of the theater, informed Dad and me that it was based on an epsiode), watched Next Generation (Picard converted my father to the Star Trek fandom, and got him to shave his comb-over, so well done Gene Roddenberry), watched DS9 (my husband's favorite), watched Voyager ... and, well, I fell away from the faith.
There's actually other things there--like my little punk rock high school friends who'd come to my house and pile into our living room to watch Next Generation, or how I stopped watching DS9 for while until the Cardassian war got going--but that's the basic timeline.
Anyway, that's a long way of getting to the point of: Mom and I went to see the new Star Trek movie, and we both really, really liked it. A lot.
I had one quibble, and that was that I'd have written the Kobayashi Maru scene a bit differently. The scene where they tell that story to David is, seriously, one of my favorite scenes ever, so I've been imagining that whole thing for years. And, in my head, that isn't how it happened. Of course, the Romulans have changed the timeline, so maybe it happened my way originally ....
I also found out something about myself that I did not know before. Apparently the one character in Star Trek that I cannot stand to see played by someone new is ... Sulu.
Sulu. Seriously? Sulu.
I totally expected to find Chris Pine or Zachary Quinto feeling wrong. I was prepared for personal issues with the new casting of my two favorite characters (Scotty and McCoy), but Karl Urban and Simon Pegg actually managed to be my favorites in the film, too. But nope, it was Sulu I couldn't get past. He's George Takei, and that's it. I think it's the voice. The man has a gorgeous voice. Well, and he was totally hot when he went all shirtless in the hall with his saber ... but I digress.
So, yeah, I loved it. Mom and I spent the ride home discussing every little homage moment, every weird little reference (she got the Enterprise shout-out, but we missed the rumored tribble cameo). It was cool. Dad can have his Next Generation, Scott can have his DS9, somebody out there can probably have Voyager and Enterprise ... but my mother and I remain old-school Trek fans. Not fundamentalist, mind you, but old-school. :)
And then we watched the season finale of Lost, which I missed due to work. We bought it off iTunes and watched it on Scott's MacBook, so we saw it in HD. I kept getting distracted by the picture quality, which was annoying me--oh my god the beach looked good!--but the episode was really really good!
I kept doing my call-it-two-seconds-before-the-reveal thing, and now I'm trying to figure out who's working for who, and is Jack's crazy-ass plan actually going to work? because if it does, I am not sure how I feel about that.
AAAND ... Scott watched the finale of Fringe yesterday, too (on Hulu), so it was one giant JJ Abrams day, with extra bonus Spock. Really, one of the two guys on the beach should have been Leonard Nimoy.
Winona Ryder?
So I watched all the re-runs, read some of the books (Spock's World was a good one, and there was this collection of essays that I remember because it had one, written at the time of the show, discussing Spock's "surprising" sex appeal), saw the movies when they came out (the first one? Boring. Second one? Awesome. Particularly when Mom, on the way out of the theater, informed Dad and me that it was based on an epsiode), watched Next Generation (Picard converted my father to the Star Trek fandom, and got him to shave his comb-over, so well done Gene Roddenberry), watched DS9 (my husband's favorite), watched Voyager ... and, well, I fell away from the faith.
There's actually other things there--like my little punk rock high school friends who'd come to my house and pile into our living room to watch Next Generation, or how I stopped watching DS9 for while until the Cardassian war got going--but that's the basic timeline.
Anyway, that's a long way of getting to the point of: Mom and I went to see the new Star Trek movie, and we both really, really liked it. A lot.
I had one quibble, and that was that I'd have written the Kobayashi Maru scene a bit differently. The scene where they tell that story to David is, seriously, one of my favorite scenes ever, so I've been imagining that whole thing for years. And, in my head, that isn't how it happened. Of course, the Romulans have changed the timeline, so maybe it happened my way originally ....
I also found out something about myself that I did not know before. Apparently the one character in Star Trek that I cannot stand to see played by someone new is ... Sulu.
Sulu. Seriously? Sulu.
I totally expected to find Chris Pine or Zachary Quinto feeling wrong. I was prepared for personal issues with the new casting of my two favorite characters (Scotty and McCoy), but Karl Urban and Simon Pegg actually managed to be my favorites in the film, too. But nope, it was Sulu I couldn't get past. He's George Takei, and that's it. I think it's the voice. The man has a gorgeous voice. Well, and he was totally hot when he went all shirtless in the hall with his saber ... but I digress.
So, yeah, I loved it. Mom and I spent the ride home discussing every little homage moment, every weird little reference (she got the Enterprise shout-out, but we missed the rumored tribble cameo). It was cool. Dad can have his Next Generation, Scott can have his DS9, somebody out there can probably have Voyager and Enterprise ... but my mother and I remain old-school Trek fans. Not fundamentalist, mind you, but old-school. :)
And then we watched the season finale of Lost, which I missed due to work. We bought it off iTunes and watched it on Scott's MacBook, so we saw it in HD. I kept getting distracted by the picture quality, which was annoying me--oh my god the beach looked good!--but the episode was really really good!
I kept doing my call-it-two-seconds-before-the-reveal thing, and now I'm trying to figure out who's working for who, and is Jack's crazy-ass plan actually going to work? because if it does, I am not sure how I feel about that.
AAAND ... Scott watched the finale of Fringe yesterday, too (on Hulu), so it was one giant JJ Abrams day, with extra bonus Spock. Really, one of the two guys on the beach should have been Leonard Nimoy.
Winona Ryder?
no subject
Date: 2009-05-18 03:47 am (UTC)I seriously loved the movie too, but I have a problem with the reboot of the Star Trek universe (I'm not sure if you saw my spoiler-y post about it from last week when I saw it or not). But, I seriously enjoyed it, and it was a really needed kick-in-the-pants for the whole thing. I think one thing that made me sad was how generally lousy the Next Gen movies were... it was time that there was a good movie again.
Another quibble I have now it's been a few days since I've seen it. While the Admiral Archer thingy was kinda funny and cute, IIRC, there'd be no way that Admiral Archer would still be alive. I thought ST:Enterprise took place about 80 years prior to ST:TOS.
Hm... although, now I think about it, McCoy was... 130(?) or so when he made his appearance on the 1701-D in the first episode, so I guess the assumption of longer life expectancies is there.
oh, here I go, sorry ... :)
Date: 2009-05-18 11:35 am (UTC)So, that said, I'm just thrilled that they made a really good movie that doesn't destroy the original series--I can work with alternate realities.
And Uhura/Spock didn't bother me at all--I vaguely remember an episode where they're flirting in the rec hall, I think the same one where Sulu goes buckling his swash down the hall. :)
I don't know how much of my Spock-knowledge is actual canon vs. from the books, but since he didn't finish the kohlinarr training, he didn't purge his emotions, sdo he has to control them. Which, yes, was a lot harder when he was younger. Still, I think he was letting a little loose in this movie. :)
Hey, maybe Archer's dog was stuffed and in the Srarfleet museum ...? :)
no subject
Date: 2009-05-18 11:36 am (UTC)Re: oh, here I go, sorry ... :)
Date: 2009-05-19 02:25 am (UTC)The thought I had, also, was that in "The Menagerie," he was pretty emotional, and that was supposedly 12 years before ST:TOS, so it seemed like he definitely was struggling with it more when he was younger. I was ok with that... just the thing with Uhura felt a bit contrived. I mean, really - of all the women in Starfleet?
(also, the episode you're talking about... I vaguely remember that one. They were all under the influence of something though, right?)
I'm still unconvinced about the alternate reality thing. It makes me grumpy. :)
Re: oh, here I go, sorry ... :)
Date: 2009-05-20 12:29 am (UTC)Well, really, I found myself a little disturbed by Scotty's amorality about the beagle. Though I think he said "living thing" specifically, so my theory may be screwed. *My* thought was more "How old was the dog?" No way it's the same beagle as in the series. :)
I admit, watching Spock and Uhura making out on the transporter pad made me think, "Dude, your dad said to go with the anger/revenge thing, not the lust. Save it for the Ponn-Faar!" Teenagers. :)
God, there were so many eps where they were under the influence of something--but the one I'm thinking of, the bug or whatever reduced inhibitions to a crazy degree.
I'm still unconvinced about the alternate reality thing. It makes me grumpy. :)
You have always been much more idealistic than I am. It's okay. One of us needs to demand excellence from pop culture. :)