Star Trek Reboot – Mark II

Crossposted from my Blogetary:



Just as Ryan Harvey stated about "Iron Man Three" in his Black Gate review earlier this month, it's hard to really write about "Star Trek Into Darkness" without letting out a bunch of spoilers (and we don't want to do that, do we). And no matter what I say there will be people who won't like it for various reasons: it doesn't fit into the traditional canon, they don't like J.J. Abrams (Yeah, I don't either, but, as with Tom Cruise, he often makes a good movie), it's not the Kirk/Spock/Bones/Sulu/Uhura/Chekov/Scotty they grew up with and they are uncomfortable with this reboot.

Well, if you didn't like the first prequel reboot you probably will hate this movie even more and you should probably quit reading now and find your nearest streaming provider to watch the other Star Trek movies or series, or see if KDOC/MeTV is playing reruns to get your ST:TOS or TNG fix. Really, don't read anymore or you'll probably get apoplectic.
Otherwise, read on.

First, before we begin, did you notice a few weeks ago this little meme going around? The mashup of Torchwood and Star Trek?


For anyone familiar with the Doctor Who and Torchwood series, the long-coated form of the delicious Captain Jack Harkness is a familiar sight, however not one normally associated with Star Trek per se. And yet, once you watch this second prequel (as it was called at the screening at Paramount I went to), you wonder where Captain Jack and the Doctor were during the entire movie (indeed, about halfway through I started wondering why Benedict Cumberbatch hasn't been tapped to play the Doctor as yet, although he's still got that Sherlock thing going on....).

As stated at the screening, this is a "second prequel" – we see Kirk, Spock, Uhura and Sulu in an opening sequence. They have moved beyond the new recruits in the first prequel, but are still raw and young and don't think things out. They think with their hearts (even Spock) and all view the world through their various moral POVs. They are all trying to do the right thing, however they all have different ideas of what the right thing is (isn't that just life?). They are practicing the shoot-from-the-hip "cowboy diplomacy" that Picard accused the original Spock of doing in The Next Generation (Season 5/Episode 8/Unification II). Where an older and wiser Kirk may have thought through his moves first, this younger more impetuous Kirk is just beginning to learn when to jump into the fray and when to back down. And he hasn't gotten it down just yet. This is classic Star Trek. Several times at the beginning Kirk and the audience are both reminded that he is not good at playing by the rules and during his last command he didn't lose any of his crew. More classic Trek and a prompt as to just how young James Tiberius Kirk is at this point.

HOWEVER, while the storyline at the beginning is classic Star Trek, the movements on the screen are classic Star Wars. And this mashup continues throughout the movie. This isn't just a movie for people who love Star Trek. It's a movie for people who love the genre. There were so many inside references that I noticed at the screening that I wondered how many other allusions I was missing. I do believe that, in part, this was a love letter from J. J. Abrams to all the scifi/fantasy fan boys and girls out there in the 'verse. When this movie comes out on DVD I'll be sure to go through it and see what I missed. The opening scene where Kirk and Scotty (I think it's Scotty?) are running from pre-industrial beings on a planet and trying to obey the Prime Directive and make it to the ship at the same time is straight forward Luke Skywalker and Han Solo, while the tiffs and interactions (chemistry if you will) between Uhura and Spock is reminiscent of Princess Leia and Han Solo or (if you liked the new ones) Padmé Amidala and Anakin Skywalker. There are also some flying sequences that are straight out of the Millennium Falcon playbook. And then let's not forget Scotty's little friend who looks like a grayed-out Ewok.

But it's not just Star Wars. There are also references to the Original Series episodes (definitely a tribble on the screen) and movies, as well as inside jokes (like when Kirk tells Chekov to "put on a red shirt" at one point and at another, tells some security guys they're just big targets in their red shirts and to change into civilian clothes) and appearances by other Star Trek characters. And at one point there was a character who said, "What do you think I am, a Peacekeeper?!" I just about lost it. Now, if there was a Farscape reference in there, then there must have been Stargate SG-1 references, because both those series were very faithful in alluding to Star Trek as a nod and a wink to genre fans. In my perfect world, there would also be Buffy/Angel/Firefly references. As it was, I'm pretty sure some of the verbal altercations between Kirk and Spock were ripped off from Leonard and Sheldon from The Big Bang Theory. Things were just moving a bit fast for me to catch everything though.

Now, we don't watch movies just to see mashups and insider references, though they do make movies lots of fun. But if that's all we saw, those movies would get old and insular. Don't worry if you're not a fan boy or girl, though. If you like scifi action adventure this is a nonstop roller coaster ride. There are great lines, a couple of flashes of skin for those looking for it, fights with the bad guy, fights with the good guy and even a couple of tearful scenes and twists in the plot. On the whole, an enjoyable ride if you are just a straightforward fan of scifi action adventure.

Not everyone likes roller coaster rides, however. And to give the naysayers their due, Star Trek as a whole is just as much about the drama as it is the action. Whether it's Picard fighting Cardassian torture in TNG (There Are Four Lights! ), the low-budget but suspenseful TOS Doomsday Machine, or Commander Sisko considering his options in the Season 6 episode "Far Beyond the Stars" where his visions show him as a science fiction writer of the 1950s who's work has been suppressed, Star Trek traditionally spends just as much time on thoughtful suspense and drama as they do on action. And there really isn't much of that type of drama in this movie. But, these characters have not built a chemistry on the small screen in front of a weekly audience, either. Television series can take the time to build relationships and create arcs where movies don't have that luxury. The Star Trek movies were able to harvest and glean the chemistry and story lines built up over the series to add depth to their movies. In "Star Trek III: The Search for Spock," people watching Kirk hearing his son being killed over the 'com felt the drama of that moment based not just on the movie, but on three years of a tv series and at least two other previous movies.

And yet, I don't think we should give up on expecting good drama out of the Star Trek franchise. I just think that J.J. Abrams is to the Star Trek reboot movies what Chris Columbus was to the Harry Potter movies. He got the series going and he told a good story with some fun hooks. Just as with Harry Potter, there's lots of action and lots of kids screaming and much of what is included in the movies is for the benefit of "the youngsters." However, also like the Harry Potter movies, both the fans and the characters will grow up. I think eventually, if Paramount continues in this new reboot, they will move onto another director who will tell more grown up stories with more depth, more drama, more suspense and maybe a tiny bit less action. The characters aren't going to be raw new kids anymore. You can pull out the screw ups and screaming kids pulling a victory out of their butts a limited amount of times before it gets old. Then it's time for the grown up stories.

So, I enjoyed this one. I look forward to the next, should it come to pass.

And I leave you with this Audi commercial depicting the relationship between the "old" Spock and the "new" Spock that gives a good indication as to some of the fun mashup available in "Star Trek Into Darkness."

Being Relevant

Crossposted from Blogetary:

I love Los Angeles. When I was growing up I never thought I would love Los Angeles. I always figured I would be a San Francisco or New York person. Or Seattle, maybe. In my imagination I might have a cabin at Lake Chelan or a beach house in Malibu, but I also always had a city penthouse, and that was always in San Francisco or New York. Sometimes Vancouver B.C.

In grade school I used to daydream about living in a loft apartment in New York that looked like a warehouse on the outside and was beautiful and Bohemian on the inside. And I’d be a poet/writer/director/actress. I checked out plays from the library and I had my sister act out some of the parts and I’d act out the others. We used the picnic table as a stage.

Then in high school I decided San Francisco was it. That was where my dad lived. That was where all the cool artistic hippies lived. And when I traveled with our music department to Anaheim for the trip to Disneyland, I got a taste for that, too.

After college I lived in Seattle for a little while. Worked, hung out with friends. Worked some more. I didn’t fall in love with Seattle though, and moved back to Bellingham.

Then some friends of mine moved to Los Angeles and I came down to visit on a vacation. “It’s warm,” they said. “We can go to the beach.” I was tired of feeling like I was going nowhere in Bellingham. I was feeling like my only relevance was as “the coffee lady” at Starbucks. No one knew my name; I was just the coffee lady. I wrote sometimes and went for walks, planned going on vacation, used the money to fix the car whenever it broke down instead, dreamed of meeting someone different and not feeling like I was just having a nothing life in a small town. I’d tried working up in Starbucks as a lead clerk and had considered management and I hated it. I felt irrelevant. I felt like I didn’t count, like my voice, even if it was heard, was being ignored.

So, a vacation sounded good. And I took a flight down to Los Angeles California and promptly fell in love with this city. I ran around everywhere in shorts. It was August and uber-hot here, but I didn’t mind. It was glorious. And I was relevant. People move here from all over to follow their dreams and I had dreams. I was relevant. My dreams were relevant. I counted. I may not have counted as the skinny, blonde model, but I still counted.

I made up an excuse about missed flights and extended my stay about about two days. And when I got back to work and realized I was just as bitter and unhappy as I’d been before I left, and that the vacation hadn’t helped, I realized it was time to quite or move or do both. And I schemed and planned, contacted people in Seattle, San Francisco and Los Angeles (in case it wasn’t the location, but just the need to leave Bellingham). In the end, there was a job opening in Los Angeles, and a friend of a friend needed a roommate and by October I was driving down here.

I’ve told this story before in some places, so it may sound familiar.

Los Angeles is a city where people come to follow their dreams. And yes, there’s a serious self-centered eternal-youth culture here. And yes, in some cases, if you’re not rich then no one hears you. But as an artist, you count. This is why I love this city. As vain, vapid and shallow as it can be, if you are an artist, you count.

I lived in San Francisco for a few years and you’d think that artists would count in that grand city. It’s a wonderful city. I fall in love with it every time I’m there. I think it used to be about artists and writers, you can feel it in the bones of the streets and buildings when you’re there, but no longer. Now, it’s a city of businesses and technology. That’s not a bad thing. It’s still a grand city, but when I lived there the discussions at parties always centered around promotions, credit ratings and getting the next apartment (because people were always looking for a better apartment). Discussions about poetry and novel writing were pretty much met with blank looks (at least in my experience). The topic changed to something safer, like dating.

In Los Angeles, for the most part, whether you moved here to become a director and work as a grip or came here to be an actress and work as a waitress, you still count. It took me a long time to really love and get Los Angeles, but eventually I realized that the people who live here get you when you move here. Maybe you will make it. Maybe you won’t. Maybe they will make it or maybe they won’t. Maybe the guy at the next table in the restaurant is regular CPA, but he’s a CPA who knows how to do taxes for entertainers. The tech guy might be the one fixing the PC in the real estate office, but chances are he’s got a girlfriend or boyfriend acting in a production or trying out for a part somewhere. The bank teller with a husband and kids helps business people, regular folk and probably is really used to seeing the yo-yo like balances of people who work in the entertainment and freelance industries.

Nothing is sure here. You might have a job one week and looking for another gig the next. Half the city is freelancing and there’s security in that insecurity. Even the earthquakes know that. In the middle of change and chaos and destruction is creativity and growth. The normal and the other intermix here in a surreal concoction of real and unreal so that sometimes, if you’re not quite with us, you might lose your sense of grounding, of what really is and what really isn’t. But the point is that the people here get why you – the writer/artist/actor/singer/etc.– moved here and you count. Gone are the days where you flounder trying to explain to the Muggles of the world why you do what you do as they fidget and shrug off your hobby. You are relevant.

Until you’re not.

The thing about this grand, epic surreal Hollywood culture is that its demand for perfect youth and beauty has taken over not only Los Angeles, but the world, and has attracted a number of people to this city (let’s say a percentage that wavers between 10 and 25%) who either truly think that’s the only thing that matters or have bought into the surreal unreality that that is all that matters. As far as they’re concerned, if you’re useful, etc., you’re mostly okay. But it’s no secret that youth, beauty and wealth (or usefulness/connections) are the accepted trifecta demanded of the gods of the City of Dreams, or so these acolytes believe. And if you buy into that, or are around people who buy into that, if you start losing one part of the trifecta, then you better get it back or start working harder on the other two. If you lose two, then you better hold onto the last one with a death grip. But, if you are no longer young, beautiful or wealthy (or useful and have connections), then watch out. You are in danger of becoming irrelevant. To those people, you will essentially become invisible. Some of those acolytes of the city gods who once stopped to speak to you in the hallway will nod, looking down or away, checking their phones and muttering things about being late for appointments. Some people you once considered good friends will forget to return phone calls and emails. Where once your struggling with family, health or artistic angst had been met with concern, now it is ignored. You remind them of their own problems, now. And you’re not useful to them anymore.

I’m not pointing all this out on my own account, I have lots of friends over the years who’ve had to deal with this. Some people leave L.A. because of it, some choose to stick around, because if you stick it out long enough this really cool thing happens. It doesn’t feel cool at first, because you’ve gotten used to the mosaic of real, unreal and surreal that mixes around here. But, you’ve also gotten used to the ground shifting beneath your feet, so as it shifts again, you notice that with all that shaking all the dross, all the dirt and grease and crap that was clinging to this mosaic has fallen away. All those useless people who only wanted a part of you because you were useful to them have now disappeared leaving behind only the ones who really matter, who really care. They are the ones who know you really matter and they really matter to you. You all understand the hard work you’ve put into your particular craft over the years and understand that you may not make it big anytime soon, but that your craft is still relevant. You still matter. You are still relevant.