New Star Trek Movie!

The full trailer for the new Star Trek movie is finally online. There's been some debate over what it's supposed to be about. The oldest rumors said that it was about Kirk and Spock's first adventure in Starfleet Academy. That seemed like an absolutely lousy premise to me. However, now that the still photos and full trailer are out, it seems that the events of the movie occur well after the Academy. The director (J. J. Abrams, who directed Cloverfield) and the writers say that the movie won't violate the history established by the original TV show, but a lot of what I've heard suggests that that might not be true. It doesn't really matter to me; I'm perfectly happy with a reboot ("rebooting" means to take the basic premise of an old series and to reimagine or revise it; this was done with Battlestar Galactica, Bionic Woman, and most recently with Knight Rider).

The opinion regarding casting has been fairly neutral, with most comments being along the lines of "he's a decent actor, but he doesn't look like such-and-such." However, the notion of Zachary Quinto as Spock has been taken pretty well by the Star Trek fans. Quinto has made a name for himself as Sylar on Heroes and he looks more like Leonard Nimoy than almost any other well-known actor. The Heroes fans among us will have a hard time forgetting him as the brain-stealing supervillain, though.

The images of the redesigned Enterprise have caused some controversy. Many have pointed out that it's very different from the ship on the original TV series, but that it's similar to the Enterprise refit from the movies. Now I know that normal people can't see the difference between the Enterprise in the '60s show and the Enterprise in the new movie, but trust me, the nerds can tell the difference (the deflector dish glows, the primary hull connects farther back on the secondary hull, the secondary hull undercut is much longer, the front end of the warp nacelles/Bussard collectors is totally different...). I actually like the design, which makes me somewhat of a Trek heretic.


The photos of the new Enterprise bridge have also had a mixed reception. It's certainly not the cardboard and plywood set of the TV show, but some have criticized it as looking like it was made for a Galaxy Quest sequel. Again, I quite like the new bridge's look.


Anyway, I'm really looking forward to this movie. The rest of the Star Trek fan base seems to be divided: some are cautiously optimistic while others are bitterly pessimistic, slouching in front of the computer in their parents' basement and posting on Star Trek-themed bulletin boards about how Trek lost it's way sometime during The Next Generation or Deep Space Nine. These are the same whiners whose lack of support allowed Star Trek Enterprise to get cancelled a few years back (yes, I'm still bitter about it).