Location: A simple man leading a complicated life....
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Star Trek is 50 years old today
Now 50, "Star Trek" continues to live long and prosper
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There, among the Kirks and the Spocks and the Hortas, Salie found perhaps “Star Trek”’s most important fan of all: 83-year-old Bjo Trimble.
Trimble told Salie that, upon sitting down in front of her TV on September 8, 1966, “We were thrilled to have grownup science fiction finally. Not, you know, ‘There’s an ugly monster, let’s kill it!’”
That night, Bjo and her husband, John, discovered a sci-fi show they could warm up to, in the middle of the Cold War.
Salie asked, “What kind of message did ‘Star Trek’ give to audiences who were worried that the world might be blown up in the next ten years?”
“Well, the message was, maybe it wouldn’t be,”Trimble replied.
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Trimble said of her husband, “We talked about it. And he said, ‘There oughta be something we could do about that.”
Using 20th century technology of pen, paper and postage stamps, Trimble boldly went where no fan has gone before, and began a letter-writing campaign to save “Star Trek.”
Letters were sent not just to NBC, “but to all the NBC affiliates, to all your local TV stations and, most importantly, all the sponsors,” she said.
It worked! “Star Trek” was renewed for one more season. Though officially cancelled after that third season, Trimble’s efforts meant that “Star Trek” now had enough episodes (79 of them) to live on in reruns.
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“Things like a communicator-cell phone, the use of computers, flat-screen monitors, iPads,” said Mike Massimino, a special advisor to the Intrepid Museum in New York City. He grew up watching “Star Trek.” A few decades later, he explored the final frontier for himself, as a NASA astronaut.
But it wasn’t just the technology that was ahead of its time. “If you look at the space program in the ‘60s when it came out, it was primarily white male test pilots who were there,” Massimino said. “Then it expanded -- they took civilian scientists, and then men and women of color. And even big Italian guys from New York, me!”
My mom watched Star Trek in the 60s and introduced it to me during TNG. I wasted far too much of my youth being a Trekkie. Most of it wore off by highschool but I still thoroughly enjoy it and I'm glad I saw Leonard Nimoy at Comic Expo.
Let's say a guy wants to get into Star Trek. Where does one start, and how? Watch the show from start to end first? Movies? No movies?
I know that if someone is getting into Star Wars for the first time, I tell them to watch Episode 4, 5, 2, 3, 6, 7 then if you are bored watch 1.
It depends on your personal tastes and what you are looking for. They are all so vastly different.
I would recommend TOS, TOS Movies, Star Trek (2009) movies, DS9 (best series overall). I know many who would disagree with that. I just have difficulty enjoying TNG, Voyager, and Enterprise. I find them really cheesy when viewing now.
TOS has that great 1960s retro ness to it that keeps it fresh for me (like going back to watch 1960s Batman) and Stephen Fry explains very well what makes TOS' structure so classic and how most of human history can be explained in Star Trek plots:
And then TNG
And then DS9 (save the best in my opinion for last)
Then you can watch Enterprise
And completely skip Voyager cause crap.
Its tough with the books because it almost seems like there's no control on what's accepted Canon and what's not. They've had three or 4 different series with completely different histories in them especially concerning the mirror universe (BTW mirror mirror is probably the best star trek episode of all the series). I read a few of the Shatner Star Trek books and he's not a bad writer, but for the most part the rest are pretty poor.
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It depends on your personal tastes and what you are looking for. They are all so vastly different.
I would recommend DS9, TOS, TOS Movies, Star Trek (2009) movies. I know many who would disagree with that. I just have difficulty enjoying TNG, Voyager, and Enterprise. I find them really cheesy when viewing now.
TOS has that great 1960s retro ness to it that keeps it fresh for me (like going back to watch 1960s Batman) and Stephen Fry explains very well what makes TOS' structure so classic:
Nice catch in terms of the movies the original cast movies were just plain better then the NG movies and even the nutrek movies.
In terms of my movie rankings
ST 2 TWOK - Such a great movie even though the effects are a little dated now. Really good tension building and a exceptional villain. It was a great formula in that Kirk and Kahn never met face to face. RM was the perfect villain. Shatner still chewed scenary but this was probably his second best kirk
ST 3 TSFS - Really well done, I enjoyed it because the premise and the villain were so random and it focused around the comrade ship of the crew. Christopher Lloyd and John Laraquette (sp?) were brilliant klingons and send us back to the Klingons from the origianl series where they were more pirate then honor chasers. "You klingon bardard you killed my boy" still sticks to me.
ST 6 TUC - Great great movie, again brilliant casting of the villain with Chris Plummer chewing the scenery as a Shakespeare quoting Klingon. This was the movie where they both let the crew age and also said goodbye. The final Captain's log made me misty eyed.
ST 4 TVH - The premise was simply silly, but brilliant at the same time. This was the movie that really cemented the crew. They were funny and glib and confident and the interaction between Spock and Kirk and McCoy was brilliant. the discussion between McCoy and Spock about death was breathtakingly funny and logical. "My friend took too much LDS in college"
Star Trek First contact - Probably the best of a bad lot of movies by the Generations cast. It bought the Borg into play and at the same time wrecked the borg by bringing in a flawed Queen. It had some great scenes, but frankly what hurt it was that at this point they were beginning to make the franchise more of a Picard Data vehicle then an ensemble cast.
Star Trek reboot - I kind of liked this movie and it had a quaint charm to it. But the premise was incredibly stupid and the villain was just doing dumb things. He had the red matter he could have prevented the death of his home world when he was flung back in time, but instead went around in a stupid quest for revenge, and then left no guard around his super weapon. What made this movie decent was that the casting just worked though Kirk was the weakest character in the film.
Star Trek TMP - I liked this movie because its a tug at nostelgia the problem was that it lacked the pacing of the series. But the loving 10 minute return to the Enterprise was great and at the same time the casual fan wouldn't appreciate it as much. I thought the story line was brilliant, but the difficulty with the cast was that the movie was first of all too sterile in its look. And the cast really didn't have the chemistry of the series.
Star Trek Generations - I wasn't a fan of this movie. They basically just created this whole Kirk thing that was kind of stupid. They actually made Malcolm McDowell boring which is really tough to do. the plot line itself was kind of nonsense. And I really wanted to punch Riker in the face lots.
Star Trek into Darkness (I haven't seen the new one yet so I can't judge it) but this movie was a disappointment. First and foremost they did the dumb thing of trying to recreate an icon and it failed BC is a great actor but he's no kahn. The plot line just felt recycled, they worked too hard on the crew chemistry and Peter Weller just wasn't great as the main villian.
Star Trek 5 - This was just horrible in every aspect. The only thing that made it a bit redeemable was the line "Excuse me but what does God need with a Starship). The Klingon villian was stupid. They made the crew do uncharacteristic things and the Scotty knocking himself out was just cringeworthy. But the good news for the franchise is it couldn't get any worse.
Star Trek Insurrection - Wait it did. this was the real beginning of the Picard Data show and the rest of the cast stood around and fluttered their hands. The villians were stupid the plot twist could be seen from miles away and you don't need a crew to control a massive star ship when you have Riker and a flight stick. But its great we've really hit rock bottom this time I prom . . .
Star Trek Nemisis - aw shyt we fell off another cliff. This movie was horrible. Fans were pumped because the Gladiator writer was bought on board to direct. But as a director he's an writer and clearly not a great one. This was just dreadful and even though Tom Hardy tried he couldn't bring a boring villain to life. A completely stupid mind rape of Troi scene just so they could show how bad the villain is. A super powerful warship with a fatal flaw left unshielded on the bridge (Romulan engineers are idiots). a rip off scene to the lord of the rings. A death of a main character where he died and they basically bought us back made me feel like the writers were laughing at the fans who paid money to watch this piece of crap.
By the end of this I was glad to hear that we would never see a TNG movie again because with the exception of First contact the whole movie line was garbage and even first contact was sub par.
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Let's say a guy wants to get into Star Trek. Where does one start, and how? Watch the show from start to end first? Movies? No movies?
I know that if someone is getting into Star Wars for the first time, I tell them to watch Episode 4, 5, 2, 3, 6, 7 then if you are bored watch 1.
Well first off hopefully you get better advice about Trek than you give about Star Wars .
All series and maybe some of the movies are on Netflix so you should be able to test a bit to see what you like. Some people just can't handle the camp and low budget nature of TOS. Even the first one or two seasons of TNG are kind of meh but I loved the rest of the seasons. I personally always thought DS9 sucked. Voyager and enterprise are entirely skipable.
As for movies, well even if you don't like TOS, I'd give Khan and Voyage Home a chance at least. Same with TNG movies.
I'd say try a bit and see what you like and go from there.
For me I'd rank them TNG, DS9, Enterprise, TOS and Voyager.
TNG is how I got into Trek and DS9 got so good. Enterprise beats out TOS for me because I just never got into the Original Series. I loved the movies and the characters are fantastic but it was tough for me to get past the cheesy effects of the TV show.
Voyager is just a mess. I wanted to like it and the premise was cool but they had too many annoying characters (Chakotay, Paris, Neelix, Harry Kim and Kes).
Watch the original series season 1 episode 'Space Seed'
Watch Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (Space Seed is the backstory to this movie, and it is the best movie)
Watch Star Trek III: The Search for Spock
Watch Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home
This is a good way to start off, as these movies are considered a trilogy within the franchise. If you are not interested in investing more time into it after that, you likely never would be.
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TNG: The Next Generation. Captain Picard and Data drive the show. The first few seasons are pretty uneven, and Levar Burton's performance has not aged terribly well. It has some of the best individual episodes, and you don't need to have seen any previous Star Trek to just drop in on a random season 5 episode. It's nice that way. All the episodes with Q are great, except the Robin Hood one.
DS9: Deep Space Nine. The most ambitious of the Star Trek series. It takes the perfect world of TNG and forces it to deal with reality. Full of terrific acting, but it's somewhat inaccessible - the Dominion plot thread begins at the tail end of season 2, and goes until the end of the show.
Voyager: Voyager. It's better than no Star Trek. There's a really great episode with Andy Dick. Seriously. The Doctor-focused episodes are probably the best. Harry Kim is the worst character in all of Star Trek history.
Enterprise: People tell me it's better than I remember. In my personal view, it suffers from an awful, awful, AWFUL theme song. TNG, DS9 and Voyager all have objectively beautiful orchestral openings, with some beautiful visuals that really set the tone for the show you're about to watch. TNG is a fun space adventure. DS9 (especially in the first two seasons) really makes you feel how alone and isolated they are on the station. Voyager is lost in the far reaches of space.
Enterprise has a Rod Stewart knockoff singing a song called Faith of the Heart, and it sucks.
TOS: The original series. I'm weird in the sense that I never really got heavy into the original TV show. I think the original movies, especially 2, 3, and 4, are wonderful. I'd recommend watching Wrath of Khan on its own, and then Search for Spock and Voyage Home back to back. I've probably seen those three specifically upwards of a hundred times - Search for Spock has some of the best music in the whole history of the franchise.
Into Darkness is awful. Star Trek 2009 is fine, but a successful genocide to conclude the first act is way out of place. Haven't seen Star Trek Beyond, but I've heard it's better than Into Darkness.
The TNG movies are unwatchable outside of First Contact, and even that's a deeply flawed movie. It's charming though, and it's got great visuals that still hold up. Insurrection is awful because it's essentially Picard doing something he bitched Wesley out for doing ten years earlier. Only this time, Picard stands to get laid, so he's willing to jeopardize the security of the Federation.
Nemesis could have ruined Tom Hardy's career. But it didn't. And for that, we should all be thankful.
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Star Trek Beyond was back in IMAX last weekend (what a surprise? Was it because Suicide Squad sucked?) and I'm glad I was able to catch it as I missed the original run in July.
Among Trek fans, it's considered the best of the new series so far in so far as the original spirit of the show.
Also, baffling that the new movie didn't release tomorrow instead of in mid-July. No competition, could really pump the 50th anniversary angle, Star Trek getting lots of attention right now... probably would've got at least another $50 million at the box office. Instead it relied on it's foreign gross to even break even and is almost out of theatres.
Location: A simple man leading a complicated life....
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Capt. Kirk: All right, you mutinous, disloyal, computerized half-breed. We'll see about you deserting my ship. Spock: The term "half-breed" is somewhat applicable, but "computerized" is inaccurate. A machine can be computerized, not a man. Capt. Kirk: What makes you think you're a man? You're an overgrown jackrabbit. An elf with a hyperactive thyroid. Spock: Jim, I don't understand... Capt. Kirk: Of course you don't understand. You don't have the brains to understand. All you have is printed circuits. Spock: Captain, if you will excuse me.
[Tries to activate the transporter] Capt. Kirk: [blocks Spock's way and interupts] What can you expect from a simpering, devil-eared freak whose father was a computer and his mother an encyclopedia. Spock: My mother was a teacher. My father an ambassador. Capt. Kirk: Your father was a computer, like his son. An ambassador from a planet of traitors. The Vulcan never lived who had an ounce of integrity... Spock: Captain, please don't... Capt. Kirk: You're a traitor from a race of traitors. Disloyal to the core. Rotten! Like the rest of your subhuman race. And you've got the GALL... to make love to that girl! Spock: That's enough. Capt. Kirk: Does she know what she's getting, Spock? A carcass full of memory banks who should be squatting on a mushroom? Instead of passing himself off as a man? You belong in the circus, Spock, not a starship. Right next to the dog face boy!
[Spock begins beating the stew out of Kirk - he picks up a stool, ready to hit Kirk, then stops - the spore's influence is gone] Capt. Kirk: Had enough? I never realized what it took to get under that thick hide of yours. Anyhow, I don't know what you're so mad about. It isn't every first officer who gets to belt his captain... several times. Spock: You did that to me deliberately. Capt. Kirk: Believe me, Mr. Spock. It was painful. In more ways than one.
[Grabs his hurting arm] Spock: The spores. They're gone. I don't belong anymore. Capt. Kirk: You said they were benevolent and peaceful. Violent emotions overwhelm them, destroy them. I had to make you angry enough to shake off their influence. That's the answer, Mr. Spock. Spock: That may be correct, Captain, but trying to initiate a brawl with over 500 crewmen and colonists is hardly logical. Capt. Kirk: I had something else in mind. Can you put together a subsonic transmitter? Something we can hook into the communication station and broadcast over the communicators? Spock: It can be done. Capt. Kirk: Good. Let's get to work. Spock: Captain! Striking a fellow officer is a court-martial offense. Capt. Kirk: Well, if we're both in the brig, who's gonna build the subsonic transmitter? Spock: That is quite logical, Captain.
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There's this great piece of triva from that space spore episode in that the woman that spock sporks is actually Charles Bronson's wife and Bronson was on set on the day they filmed the whole love scene. The director tells Nimoy "Ok now you have to kiss her" and Nimoy looks over at Bronson who was one of the tougher guys in hollywood and basically whines "Do I have to?"
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My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Star Trek is 50 years old today
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