http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117941815?categoryid=10&cs=1&s=h&p=0

Abrams is a HACK.

Hi David. I had to change the title of your thread since it really didn't fit DVinfo's style. I don't think I've ever seen any of Abram's work myself. But are you saying that this next movie won't be "art" like the original Star Trek? ;-)

Sorry . . . don't wanna rock the boat.

No . . . Star Trek was never art, but it doesn't need to be a hackfest like Abrams will make it.

And the Starfleet 90210 concept is a sure-fire recipe for disaster. Trek is good when it takes itself seriously; it's horrible when it doesn't.

Anyway, end of geeky rant.

I'm sorry... did you miss the last decade of Trek? Berman wasn't hitting the right spot either, so I can't see how Abrahms can do any worse.

Well, "11" it's an odd number sequal anyway, so no pressure on making it particularly good. ;)

I like your "Starfleet 90210" phrase.
Can you imagine the cast.....

Kirk: Jason Priestley
Spok: Brian Austin Green
Dr. McCoy: Thomas Calabro (Dr. Michael Mancini from Melrose Place)
Mr. Scott: Ewan McGregor?
Uhura: Karyn Parsons (Hilary Banks of Fresh Prince)

and of course....
Nurse Christine Chapel: Tori Spelling

I'm sorry... did you miss the last decade of Trek? Berman wasn't hitting the right spot either, so I can't see how Abrahms can do any worse.

Oh, I by no means disagree. And because of it, I wouldn't exactly use him as a benchmark.

I just hope they are going back to the future instead of do another prequel
thing. I know a lot of fans want that, but not me. I actually liked the series
(except for enterprise) better than the TNG movies. For some reason they
all involve some form of time travel or another (I did not grow up nor watch
much of TOS).

I was at Paramount a couple of days ago and it's just unbelievable how there
is no Star Trek there what-so-ever. Talk about dissing a large chunk of your
history and income.

I know the top has just changed at Paramount, but in my very humble opinion
I think they always mis-treated Star Trek. It was visible in the early days with
Roddenberry and the years after with Rick. I thought the Star Trek experience
in Vegas was a bit of a let down. Also the DVD sets of the series look very bad
(I'm pretty sure DS9 was transferred from videotape, you can see the analog
interference every now and then), are very low on extra features (same for
the movies, even the new releases) and cost a lot more than other series on
DVD.

I, unfortunately, don't have high hopes for the future of Trek. But we'll have
to wait and see what happens.

I thought they said it was about Kirk and Spock's days at the academy?


Anyway, don't be hatin' on Jason priestly. He does have the ability to do good things. He just doesn't usually. I quite liked "Love and Death on Long Island", and this little under the radar indie called "Cold Blooded" (or something)

Not a well-written article---difficult to understand."Star Trek" has been Hollywood's most durable performer other than James Bond, spawning 10 features that have grossed more than $1 billion and 726 TV episodes from six series.I thought James Bond was a British thing, not a Hollywood thing.

Without trying to sound too inflammatory Trek for me became a pulp format a long time ago. The times when episodes were written by the calibre of Harlan Ellison seem long gone. Most episodes have a strange understanding of right and wrong, if you aren't on our side or if you don't do things the way we do then you are evil and must be destroyed. Races that are, by implication, millions of years older than us are misguided because they don't understand the value of self sacrifice for a crew mate, or the soul, or democracy (All species will eventually develop a system where presidents are elected to office - its the only way anyone can ever have peace and harmony) and are just waiting for us to turn up and educate them. Humans beings are unique among the billions of species in ways that don't seem credible and for reasons that never make sense. Every episode becomes a chance for a new writer to give the audience a lesson in morals. Trek turned this into a production line, it became too easy to construct another typical episode with half an idea and the armory of plot devices the Trek universe provides.

Enterprise I watched a few episodes, it seemed like a fresh start to go before Kirk, to get away from phasers, transporter beams, photon torpedoes and devices that make food or technology appear out of thin air if only you know how what its made of. Unfortunately, within the first episode they introduced phasers with stun and kill (Even though it makes no sense a device would understand enough about a random aliens physiology to do either of these with certainty), transporters and the rest of the usual baggage all in the first episode.

So instead of a great deal of running down corridors, close shots in cramped conditions, problem solving and exploration/sense of wonder that could have built up to the first faltering use of a transporter with uncertain results to save the captain at the end of the series, we have a 100% reliable transporter from the word go, needed to deux et machina, lift important people from imminent peril every day and twice on sundays, a whole host of new races strangely never seen before in series set later and some are evil enough to warrant extinction. If not they can always be linked with the Nazi movement and tripped over to fall on their own sword. Poetic justice in crayon.

Transporters provide last moment snatches from the jaws of death. Stun provides humane ways to deal with bad guys who are only mislead by others, must be no chance 'stun' would ever maim or kill anything, or cause unnecessary pain and no chance 'kill' will ever hit a bystander. Being able to materialize food and parts at will allows the ship to need no stores other than energy and upgrades can happen with a guest star bringing another made up technology in the nick of time. Now if only that technology was a bit more durable, it might last more than one episode, and the warp engines might survive slightly more than an enemy captains sarcasm.

In fact. We could probably write a script ourselves. Coffee stains and bad handwriting can be added later, I'd think these are requirements.

Token Alien crew member: Enemy materializing off the port bow. He's firing. We're hit, warp engines are offline
(We can't run away).
Captain: Henson, evasive maneuvers.
(Missiles with alien technology are confused by wobbly motion, luckily star trek fans are not),
Henson 2: At age 7 (What Einstein did in his lifetime, infants will do before breakfast) I did my thesis on the internal structure of red giant stars, if we can modify a photon torpedo, we can induce an eta-beta-pi plasma inversion that will create a solar flare.
Captain: Make it so/Engage/All ahead full (delete as appropriate)
The Alien ship is destroyed, only having advanced alien shields, the enterprise having American shields is undamaged.
All: Hooray!
(etc.)
(All eat pancakes.)

Anyone care to add to this?


This has been popular in the past, maybe what this hack series needs is a hack director to breath life back into it (and us to write it for him).

Well, I liked the Kirk stuff and I liked Deep Space 9.

I agree that Enterprise was too clean. I mean it is the first time they are really
out in space. People should die. Really bad things should happen. The spaceship
shouldn't just always work, etc. I guess that's why I liked DS9 so much, because
it was not afraid to show flaws, especially in people.

DS9 always had 3 stories going in each episode. It made it interesting.

Yes I liked DS9 the best of all the series. It was dirtier, had multiple show plot lines, and did a great job of digging into and showcasing the character's flaws and relationships.

On the other hand it was also the most difficult series to just jump into because there was so much back story.

As for this new movie, I'm just happy someone's still serious about producing anything Star Trek.

Another crappy Trek movie?
May the force be with you suckers....




;)

I grew up with TNG so I always have a special place for it. I enjoyed the predictability and morals lessons, but mostly I enjoyed the style of cinematography. DS9 matched it in quality for sure and it was just as good, but a few of the actors never clicked with me. Voyager had great potential and pretty decent story ideas, but the acting was just awful.

I don't know much about Abrams other than that I watch Lost religiously (since I caught the pilot on a secret cable channel 2 months before it was even announced) and Alias is dull. The studios love him because he's got strong momentum right now. Doing a feature film with the potential for failure could pretty easily make or break him, so I guess we'll find out if he's competent soon enough.

Voyager had great potential and pretty decent story ideas, but the acting was just awful.I agree. The acting was awful!

What I find so sad about the "new Trek" (and other concepts like it) is that Hollywood is getting so stale! They can't come up with an original idea so let's re-make an old one and beat it to death. Bad enough they'll do 10 sequels that just drone out the original storyline but, when they finally realize that end is used up, "Hey! Let's make a PREquel!...and a prequel to the prequel!" Good grief...

Don't get me wrong. I love Star Trek; anything and everything about it. I grew up with the adventures of Kirk and Spock and the gang. I was a closet Trekkie (or "Trekker" depending on your generation) for many, many years. Mind you, I never did (never would) dress up in a uniform and parade around a convention spouting Klingon and debating the nth level of detail of episodes...not that there's anything wrong with that.... But, I did my fair share of collecting (thanks to the "Mint" people).

And I still get the biggest kick out of seeing all the "Trek" references in shows and everyday life. When Shatner flipped open his cell phone, on "Boston Legal," and it made the communicator sound I about fell out of my chair laughing. And nobody can dispute the technology and the ideals that Roddenberry introduced into our culture. He was like the Jules Verne of our generation. We still need visionaries like him.

But, did we really need "Voyager"?, "Enterprise", or about HALF of TNG? I'm truly surprised there hasn't been a DS9 movie come out. It's like they've completely abandoned that path, and it was a fresh idea to the original story. Why can't they make a movie from the other perspective? Show how Romulans live and understand why they don't turn tail every time the Enterprise comes aknockin'.

Well, to me, it all comes down to good storytelling. And, if Abrams can pull that off, more power to him. It's a shame, though, he chose Trek to breathe new life into and not help out Joss Whedon and his wonderful series. That guy needs SOMEbody up there to champion his show before the actors all find some other commitment. A space western....now THERE's an idea!

Token Alien crew member: Enemy materializing off the port bow. He's firing. We're hit, warp engines are offline
(We can't run away).
Captain: Henson, evasive maneuvers.
(Missiles with alien technology are confused by wobbly motion, luckily star trek fans are not),
Henson 2: At age 7 (What Einstein did in his lifetime, infants will do before breakfast) I did my thesis on the internal structure of red giant stars, if we can modify a photon torpedo, we can induce an eta-beta-pi plasma inversion that will create a solar flare.
Captain: Make it so/Engage/All ahead full (delete as appropriate)
The Alien ship is destroyed, only having advanced alien shields, the enterprise having American shields is undamaged.
All: Hooray!
(etc.)
(All eat pancakes.)

Anyone care to add to this?


This has been popular in the past, maybe what this hack series needs is a hack director to breath life back into it (and us to write it for him).

All of this is what makes Galaxy Quest my second favorite "Trek" movie. ;)
(Can't help it ... still love Kahn.)

Well, to me, it all comes down to good storytelling. And, if Abrams can pull that off, more power to him. It's a shame, though, he chose Trek to breathe new life into and not help out Joss Whedon and his wonderful series. That guy needs SOMEbody up there to champion his show before the actors all find some other commitment. A space western....now THERE's an idea!

Believe it or not, that was Roddenbery's original idea for Trek- A wagontrain to the stars, is how he pitched it. He was an ex cop, turned western writer.

There was a space western. It was called "Firefly".

That would be why Edward said it after mentioning Joss Whedon Keith ;)

I thought I'd read somewhere that A space western was how Lucas originally pitched starwars. Maybe my memory is faulty.

Yes Keith, I know all about Firefly, it was great. Even the movies was excellent.

Meanwhile these folks are continuing to produce new shows in the original series:

http://www.newvoyages.com/

Shooting it in an old car dealership on an XL-1

Originally I didn't find the idea of the western and space all that appealing and gave the series a miss. But now that I've seen the entire series on DVD (after seeing the movie) I'm sad that it didn't get more of a chance.

Meanwhile these folks are continuing to produce new shows in the original series:

http://www.newvoyages.com/

Shooting it in an old car dealership on an XL-1

Yeah. They think they're creating "real" Star Trek.

I really miss the good old days coming home from school and turning on the TV to watch Captain Kirk and Dr.Who. I hate TV now. It's so boring.

I really miss the good old days coming home from school and turning on the TV to watch Captain Kirk and Dr.Who. I hate TV now. It's so boring.

I miss the good old days of coming home from school and turning on the radio to listen to Superman and Capt. Midnight. TV extinguished all those great programs and gave us a bunch of mindless pap instead. It took 20 years before the content of TV came even close to what had been produced for radio. Well actually, a few early TV shows like Omnibus, You Are There and Ernie Kovaks were really good. When Ed Sullivan had people like Beatrice Lilly and Billy deWolfe on stage, it was the best. I guess it wasn't all that bad, come to think of it, but I still miss those radio dramas.

CBC Radio sometimes replays some of the good old stuff.

I miss the good old days of shadow puppet shows and hitting sticks with rocks. Radio ruined everything.

Originally I didn't find the idea of the western and space all that appealing and gave the series a miss. But now that I've seen the entire series on DVD (after seeing the movie) I'm sad that it didn't get more of a chance.

ditto. Nearly eveyone I talk to has the same story about this show. Strange. I actually felt sad that there wasn't more when I came to the end of it. I don't think I've ever felt that way about any TV show before.

So, this new Star Trek movie. Where will it be filmed and what will be the budget? Also, who will be the main actors? I hope Tom Cruz won't be playing the captain. :-)

So, this new Star Trek movie. Where will it be filmed and what will be the budget? Also, who will be the main actors? I hope Tom Cruz won't be playing the captain. :-)
Oh, that would get an award; him jumping up and down on the captain's chair pronouncing his love for Yeoman Rand.....

Then we could have Oprah in place of Guinan.

And Rosie Odonnel as Data?

Good charactors to make it flop. Don't forget Mr. Neilson from Naked Gun. He could replace Scotty. Scotty was a Canadian, by the way.

Not only that, Scotty was at D-Day!

And he was born in Vancouver (or Victoria). :)

Who would be good to replace Spook? Dillan?

Don't know if I agree with your assessment of JJ Abrams. Alias and Lost rock pretty hard and the word is that MI:3 is pretty awesome as well. I actually dig JJ running things. As for the story.....yeah I'm not crazy about that either.

Chris Watson
Watson Videography

For me Alias started out pretty well, and while the whole SD-6/Double Agent/Father/CIA thing was satisfactory as a coathanger for each episode it was more the action, the wild costumes, the sets and Garner herself that held my attention.

By the time of the 3rd series, the wild costumes were next to nonexistant, the sets had blurred into each other, Garner's sexuality on screen was toned down with other people taking up that part, we'd ditched SD-6 as the bad guys in favour of a series of more sinister and increasingly less plausable groups and the plot started to hang more more on Abrams central Rambaldi conspiricy. With futuristic technology, prophecy and dark motives supposidly coming from a 500 year dead genius who is DaVinci in everything but name, and charectars betraying each other everytime an episode is short of a cliffhanger (or the dead! Not now! Dead again! Still dead...or are they?) the more it seemed to me like Abrams is a really corny writer. I stopped watching a while ago.

Lost I never bothered with, but the law suit that it was stolen from a script with similar plot presented to the same channel for a series with the same name 20 years ago is mighty suspicious. I'm guessing that must still be in the legal pipeline.

I think Abrams and Trek should be very happy together.

Law suit? Do you have a link for this? I'd be interested in reading about that.

One page is,

http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,17207,00.html?rsslatest

By searching for the names in there, I'm sure a thousand websites will come up. I remeber reading some details as to exactly what this guy had claimed to have written.

Either way, even if this Anthony Spinner did not originate the whole thing himself, it does suggest that what we have now was merely adapted from a much earlier ABC series proposal.

Star Trek needs reimagined, like they did with Battlestar Galactica. Maybe first contact can be with the Klingons instead of the Vulcans. Earth would be under brutal Kilingon control, until a war with the Romulans crushes the empire and gives humanity the opportunity to rise up against the Klingons. Once humans start out into space, they encounter the Vulcans, who are unwilling to help the struggling humans as they plant the seeds of the UFP. Kirk would be a leader of the rebellion, Spock an outcast who aids humans (and is seen by many humans as a spy, but Kirk trusts him).

I just pulled that out of my hat, but I probably gave it more thought than the people planning this Starfleet Academy thing.

Definitely like the "darker" Star Trek idea there, Jason. Explores the whole "Mirror, Mirror" episode as a series.....hmmmm.....

The Mirror Mirror Universe is a cool idea, but Jason just redisoverd Enterprise. We all know how well that worked out. I was probably one of the few that enjoyed it.

The Mirror Mirror Universe is a cool idea, but Jason just redisoverd Enterprise. We all know how well that worked out. I was probably one of the few that enjoyed it.

Well, Enterprise was a good idea overall, but suffered from poor execution. It got better as it went on. The last season was actually very good, with the exception of the abominable final episode.

They only put half an effort into Enterprise, and it showed. When they got the word it would be cancelled, they rushed the finale... and again, it showed. It was pretty close to Roddenbery's vision though.

For me, it's all about the cool plots. . .forget about all the race wars and stuff. I just like the cool plots where some anomaly is discovered, and is all, like, cool and stuff. Next Gen was good at that. More of that. Yes. That's what I say. That's how I like my sci fi.

Trouble is, while naming something is more important than explaining it and real physics can take a running jump, star trek fans get really anal about trivial little details. They'll complain loudly about episodes that contradict meaningless asides in completely different series. That more or less puts to death any idea of reinventing it.

In any case the established way of redoing and improving on a previous plot is to redo it with a new captain and pretend the original never happened, as with a great many next generation episodes simply redid plotlines from the original series.

For me Enterprise failed because it pretended to be a prequal and wasn't. In every way other than a few minor tie ins it was just another stale sequal with a very rare few inspired episodes. DS9 did rather better because they stole much of the premise from the Babylon 5 proposal paramount rejected. That put the whole series on a totally different footing.

The main problem for me with Enterprise was how easy it all went. This is the
first time the human race is exploring space. The spaceship is flying smoothly
(when has complex technology ever worked reliably out of the gates!). The
transporter is brand new but just works as well. How nice.

If the human race ventures out into space like that a lot of bad stuff will
probably happen before everything runs smoothly. Advanced technology such
as a transporter will not be there (I think). True, they did a lot of shuttle flying
but it still felt too comfy to me most of the time.

I guess that's why I liked Deep Space 9 so much and I like Battlestar Galactica
(the current show) and 24. People we know and care about are put into harms
way and bad stuff happens. Especially with those latter shows.

Now that is not to say I need all the dark and bad stuff, but I guess it feels
more "real". I loved The Next Generation because of the good stories, so that
worked as well. I even liked a lot of Voyager, although it was definitely below
TNG & DS9 for my tastes.

The one thing I do not understand is TOS or "the obsession" with that era or
any other prequel idea. I did not grow up with TOS and I just can't watch it
in this day and age because of how it looks. I'm sorry. It may be teriffic story
telling but I just can't get over how it looks. That's another reason Enterprise
failed for me. I know how the TOS era looks and it the older Enterprise era looks
like it came after TOS. Sorry, but I'm just not buying that.

I also cannot imagine anyone playing Kirk, Spock, Sulu etc. Even if I never
really watched TOS. In my very humble opinion it is time to let go of that era
and move forward. It is like longing back to how things were in the past because
it was so great. It will never be like that again.

Now you might be able to pull of a mirror mirror thing because that kind of makes
it "new". But I'd rather see the future of what humanity will achieve. Perhaps
something like in Stargate where you can ascent to another plane of existence,
virtual reality (like Avalon or The Matrix), artificial intelligence societies (they've
touched on that briefly in general and as a villian with the Borg).

It feels to me they are trying to get a new success by doing things from the
past (literally) with Enterprise and now a new movie.

I guess we'll just have to wait and see what will happen....