Star Trek
OK, so, Star Trek.
I was highly skeptical and downright flaily as the movie was announced and cast and developed. The cast seemed good talent-wise, but this was Trek, dammit. Leave it as it is and GET OFF MY LAWN. I watched the original series en utero, for crying out loud (thanks, Mom!). Then I watched it in syndication over and over and over again. At one point I could tell you the episode within five seconds of starting. I had all the Trek novels I could get my hands on (and some of them were really really bad). CHANGE IS BAD.
*deep breath* But, on the other hand, I adored the Battlestar Galactica reboot. But how much rebooting can an old school fan take?
Despite my friends all giving Star Trek glowing reviews, I remained dubious. But I was willing to give it a shot.
...WOW.
I love love love that it's not really a reboot. They flat out admitted it was an alternate timeline created when Nero went back in time and destroyed the Kelvin and killed George Kirk. The existence of Spock Prime (YAY Leonard Nimoy!) just confirmed that. Somewhere, his world still exists, and all the things that happened there still happened, they were not wiped clean by the new movie, yet the stage has been set for brand new adventures.
Wee!Kirk was cute in his rebellious way. (Hi, Sam! Bye, Sam! Why'd they redub the scene with "Johnny" when he went racing past?) Loved Bruce Greenwood as Pike, encouraging Kirk to join Starfleet and daring him to do better than his father. Zachary Quinto was awesome as Spock, though it's clear he's going to be a lot squishier than Prime!Spock, but hey, his planet was blown up and his mother killed before his eyes, so I'll give him that. He's not going to be the exact same character because he's not exactly the same, and I can gladly live with that. Same with Chris Pine's Kirk. The womanizing and the cockiness are still there, but the death of his father has changed the character from the Shatner!Kirk.
(Randomly, did everyone else hear the unspoken "bitch" at the end of Spock's "Live long and prosper" to the Vulcan council after he rejected their offer of enrolling in the Vulcan Science Academy? HEE.)
I was skeptical of Karl Urban as Bones. Mind you, I adored Karl Urban as Eomer in LotR, but I just couldn't imagine him filling DeForest Kelley's shoes. Bones was always my favorite of the trio so perhaps I was being overprotective, because Karl nailed it. He was awesome. One quibble -- the nickname "Bones" came from the slang "sawbones," meaning doctor, not from, as implied in the movie, McCoy saying all he had left after his divorce were his "bones." No reason to change that. (But the divorce is caaaaaaaaaaaaanon, wheeee.)
Zoe Saldana was gorgeous as Uhura -- Nyota, Nyota, they finally confirmed fanon! She never had a first name stated in the original series, so fandom named her Nyota (meaning "star"), while others called her Penda ("love"). Guess what I preferred. :D I'm totally down with Uhura/Spock, because they were close in TOS. She teased him and kind of poked at his human side. In "Charlie X" she sang a song about Spock while he played his lyre, and later he taught her how to play the Vulcan lyre herself. However, every time Spock left the bridge, Uhura was at his heels. Helllloooo, obvious. Though everyone must know now because of the smooching on the transporter pad.
Sidebar: okay, okay, I get that the miniskirts were a call back to TOS, and there were women in the background in pants, but where the heck was Uhura's rank then, since it was supposed to be and still is in the new movie on the cuffs of the sleeves. Shall have to watch out for that next time I see it. Tomorrow.
Sidebar2: Dammit, Kirk didn't lose his shirt!
John Cho was also great as Sulu. Wheee, fencing reference, but that certainly wasn't a foil he was using. I have read that John Cho, who is Korean, was a little apprehensive on playing Sulu, who I think is often called Japanese but is actually Japanese/Filipino (Abrams was not to sure about it, either). George Takei told him that Sulu represented all Asians, so don't stress over it. No, they're not interchangeable, but Gene Roddenberry wanted Sulu to represent all Asians and not have a surname that specified a certain culture -- and so the name Sulu comes from the Sulu Sea, which "touch all shores." (It doesn't really touch all the countries considered Asian, but it sounds poetic, no? :) (Trivia: Sulu was supposed to run into his wee great-great-great-grandfather in San Francisco in Star Trek IV: Save the Whales, but the boy hired to portray him was too scared.)
Anton Yelchin didn't really look like old school Chekov, but he really went for the accent. Wictor! Wictor! (Loved the lines "How old are you?" "I'm 17." "Oh great, he's 17.") He need to claim something was first inwented in Russia, though. And Simon Pegg was another I was skeptical about, but he did a good job. "I like this ship! It's exciting!"
I'm so glad Majel Barrett Roddenbery was able to voice the computer (whooo, old school!) before she passed away. And Nurse Chapel at least got a shoutout, though she wasn't seen.
Quibble: where the heck was Delta Vega that Spock Prime could watch Vulcan go 'splodey? Another planet could not be that close to see the planet that big in the sky. One planet would have to have a very unusual orbit, which is possible, but the gravitational effect would be...fascinating. And Vulcan has no moons. That's canon, baby. Also, Delta Vega is near the galactic barrier. Yes, I'm a geek. Shut UP.
Loved the Kobayashi Maru test and how Kirk was eating an apple during it (since he was eating one in Wrath of Khan when he told Saavik about how he "passed"). The finger gun was just icing on the cake.
Other tidbits of joy: references to Admiral Archer and his beagle (Porthos!), the tribble Scotty had on Delta Vega, Pike being in a wheelchair in his final scene (totally shoutout to the original pilot and the subsequent re-edit into "The Menagerie." Redshirt Engineer Olson -- DOOOOOOOOOOOMED. :D "I can't wait to kick some Romulan arse!" So done.
Signs that it was directed by JJ Abrams: Slusho, Clifford the big red evil, the Cloverleaf monster's little brother trying to chomp on Kirk.
Good lines:
Spock: I would cite regulation, but I know you will simply ignore it.
Kirk: See? We are getting to know each other.
(So very Kirk & Spock)
Spock: I am Spock.
Kirk: ...Bullshit.
Spock: [to Kirk] Out of the chair.
(Chris Pine totally had the Kirk chair pose down, too.)
Spock: I intend to assist in the effort to reestablish communication with Starfleet. However, if crew morale is better served by my roaming the halls weeping, I will gladly defer to your medical expertise. Excuse me.
Bones: Green-blooded hobgoblin...
(So very Bones & Spock)
Bones: Dammit Jim! I'm a doctor, not a physicist!
No "He's dead, Jim," though. Next time!
So, what are we left with? Kirk is captain a lot earlier. Admittedly, he joined Starfleet later as well, but it's still about an eight year difference, as Kirk didn't reach captain until he was 30. So he's going to be rasher. But still chasing after women.
Spock served under Pike for 17 years before Kirk got the Enterprise, but now only a much briefer time (if Kirk got the Enterprise immediately upon reaching the rank of captain, then Spock would've been serving under Pike for nine years or so at the time of the end of the movie, but I do vaguely recall Kirk having another ship first, so then Spock's time with Pike would be less than that). Vulcan was destroyed, but some of the elders were saved, so the culture is preserved, and a new colony is being created. Prime!Spock is still hanging around, but how much can he/will he tell his younger self about the future? The timeline is already seriously altered, so no sense in trying to preserve it. Maybe he'll send young!Spock envelopes with "Open in case of ______" on them.
The "Open in case of Khan" would say, "Don't maroon him on Ceti Alpha V. Just kill him. Trust me on this one, trust me."
I was highly skeptical and downright flaily as the movie was announced and cast and developed. The cast seemed good talent-wise, but this was Trek, dammit. Leave it as it is and GET OFF MY LAWN. I watched the original series en utero, for crying out loud (thanks, Mom!). Then I watched it in syndication over and over and over again. At one point I could tell you the episode within five seconds of starting. I had all the Trek novels I could get my hands on (and some of them were really really bad). CHANGE IS BAD.
*deep breath* But, on the other hand, I adored the Battlestar Galactica reboot. But how much rebooting can an old school fan take?
Despite my friends all giving Star Trek glowing reviews, I remained dubious. But I was willing to give it a shot.
...WOW.
I love love love that it's not really a reboot. They flat out admitted it was an alternate timeline created when Nero went back in time and destroyed the Kelvin and killed George Kirk. The existence of Spock Prime (YAY Leonard Nimoy!) just confirmed that. Somewhere, his world still exists, and all the things that happened there still happened, they were not wiped clean by the new movie, yet the stage has been set for brand new adventures.
Wee!Kirk was cute in his rebellious way. (Hi, Sam! Bye, Sam! Why'd they redub the scene with "Johnny" when he went racing past?) Loved Bruce Greenwood as Pike, encouraging Kirk to join Starfleet and daring him to do better than his father. Zachary Quinto was awesome as Spock, though it's clear he's going to be a lot squishier than Prime!Spock, but hey, his planet was blown up and his mother killed before his eyes, so I'll give him that. He's not going to be the exact same character because he's not exactly the same, and I can gladly live with that. Same with Chris Pine's Kirk. The womanizing and the cockiness are still there, but the death of his father has changed the character from the Shatner!Kirk.
(Randomly, did everyone else hear the unspoken "bitch" at the end of Spock's "Live long and prosper" to the Vulcan council after he rejected their offer of enrolling in the Vulcan Science Academy? HEE.)
I was skeptical of Karl Urban as Bones. Mind you, I adored Karl Urban as Eomer in LotR, but I just couldn't imagine him filling DeForest Kelley's shoes. Bones was always my favorite of the trio so perhaps I was being overprotective, because Karl nailed it. He was awesome. One quibble -- the nickname "Bones" came from the slang "sawbones," meaning doctor, not from, as implied in the movie, McCoy saying all he had left after his divorce were his "bones." No reason to change that. (But the divorce is caaaaaaaaaaaaanon, wheeee.)
Zoe Saldana was gorgeous as Uhura -- Nyota, Nyota, they finally confirmed fanon! She never had a first name stated in the original series, so fandom named her Nyota (meaning "star"), while others called her Penda ("love"). Guess what I preferred. :D I'm totally down with Uhura/Spock, because they were close in TOS. She teased him and kind of poked at his human side. In "Charlie X" she sang a song about Spock while he played his lyre, and later he taught her how to play the Vulcan lyre herself. However, every time Spock left the bridge, Uhura was at his heels. Helllloooo, obvious. Though everyone must know now because of the smooching on the transporter pad.
Sidebar: okay, okay, I get that the miniskirts were a call back to TOS, and there were women in the background in pants, but where the heck was Uhura's rank then, since it was supposed to be and still is in the new movie on the cuffs of the sleeves. Shall have to watch out for that next time I see it. Tomorrow.
Sidebar2: Dammit, Kirk didn't lose his shirt!
John Cho was also great as Sulu. Wheee, fencing reference, but that certainly wasn't a foil he was using. I have read that John Cho, who is Korean, was a little apprehensive on playing Sulu, who I think is often called Japanese but is actually Japanese/Filipino (Abrams was not to sure about it, either). George Takei told him that Sulu represented all Asians, so don't stress over it. No, they're not interchangeable, but Gene Roddenberry wanted Sulu to represent all Asians and not have a surname that specified a certain culture -- and so the name Sulu comes from the Sulu Sea, which "touch all shores." (It doesn't really touch all the countries considered Asian, but it sounds poetic, no? :) (Trivia: Sulu was supposed to run into his wee great-great-great-grandfather in San Francisco in Star Trek IV: Save the Whales, but the boy hired to portray him was too scared.)
Anton Yelchin didn't really look like old school Chekov, but he really went for the accent. Wictor! Wictor! (Loved the lines "How old are you?" "I'm 17." "Oh great, he's 17.") He need to claim something was first inwented in Russia, though. And Simon Pegg was another I was skeptical about, but he did a good job. "I like this ship! It's exciting!"
I'm so glad Majel Barrett Roddenbery was able to voice the computer (whooo, old school!) before she passed away. And Nurse Chapel at least got a shoutout, though she wasn't seen.
Quibble: where the heck was Delta Vega that Spock Prime could watch Vulcan go 'splodey? Another planet could not be that close to see the planet that big in the sky. One planet would have to have a very unusual orbit, which is possible, but the gravitational effect would be...fascinating. And Vulcan has no moons. That's canon, baby. Also, Delta Vega is near the galactic barrier. Yes, I'm a geek. Shut UP.
Loved the Kobayashi Maru test and how Kirk was eating an apple during it (since he was eating one in Wrath of Khan when he told Saavik about how he "passed"). The finger gun was just icing on the cake.
Other tidbits of joy: references to Admiral Archer and his beagle (Porthos!), the tribble Scotty had on Delta Vega, Pike being in a wheelchair in his final scene (totally shoutout to the original pilot and the subsequent re-edit into "The Menagerie." Redshirt Engineer Olson -- DOOOOOOOOOOOMED. :D "I can't wait to kick some Romulan arse!" So done.
Signs that it was directed by JJ Abrams: Slusho, Clifford the big red evil, the Cloverleaf monster's little brother trying to chomp on Kirk.
Good lines:
Spock: I would cite regulation, but I know you will simply ignore it.
Kirk: See? We are getting to know each other.
(So very Kirk & Spock)
Spock: I am Spock.
Kirk: ...Bullshit.
Spock: [to Kirk] Out of the chair.
(Chris Pine totally had the Kirk chair pose down, too.)
Spock: I intend to assist in the effort to reestablish communication with Starfleet. However, if crew morale is better served by my roaming the halls weeping, I will gladly defer to your medical expertise. Excuse me.
Bones: Green-blooded hobgoblin...
(So very Bones & Spock)
Bones: Dammit Jim! I'm a doctor, not a physicist!
No "He's dead, Jim," though. Next time!
So, what are we left with? Kirk is captain a lot earlier. Admittedly, he joined Starfleet later as well, but it's still about an eight year difference, as Kirk didn't reach captain until he was 30. So he's going to be rasher. But still chasing after women.
Spock served under Pike for 17 years before Kirk got the Enterprise, but now only a much briefer time (if Kirk got the Enterprise immediately upon reaching the rank of captain, then Spock would've been serving under Pike for nine years or so at the time of the end of the movie, but I do vaguely recall Kirk having another ship first, so then Spock's time with Pike would be less than that). Vulcan was destroyed, but some of the elders were saved, so the culture is preserved, and a new colony is being created. Prime!Spock is still hanging around, but how much can he/will he tell his younger self about the future? The timeline is already seriously altered, so no sense in trying to preserve it. Maybe he'll send young!Spock envelopes with "Open in case of ______" on them.
The "Open in case of Khan" would say, "Don't maroon him on Ceti Alpha V. Just kill him. Trust me on this one, trust me."