Bah. I'm with you. Dramaturgically, it sounds like a reboot.

This'll probably get yanked soon, but the "official" version goes online Monday, so anyhoo. I'll probably have more to say after I've been able to look at it in high-def, frame-by-frame.



FWIW, that opening bit of narration sounds like Bruce Greenwood, and thus like Captain Christopher Pike (i.e. the captain that Spock served under BEFORE Kirk took command of the Enterprise -- back in the days when Spock was more inclined to show emotion).

Why the sexual explicitness? Why not keep it at least as kid-friendly as most of the previous movies?

SDG wrote:
: Why the sexual explicitness? Why not keep it at least as kid-friendly as most of the previous movies?

Because the characters aren't middle-aged any more.

It's interesting, actually, how Kirk had a well-earned reputation as a ladies' man during the original series, but there's barely any trace of that in the movies. ST2:TWOK and ST:G both contain allusions to PREVIOUS relationships, and ST4:TVH might sort of include some flirting between Kirk and Dr. Gillian Taylor, but if that IS supposed to be flirting, it's incredibly subtle, and in any case, it never gets beyond a farewell kiss on the cheek. Only ST6:TUC shows Kirk getting frisky with anyone, and again, all he gets is as far as a kiss -- but when I first saw that film, and McCoy said to Kirk, "What IS it with you?", I suddenly realized just how ABSENT that side of Kirk had been from all the other films.

(Side note: In ST:TMP, the Decker-Ilia relationship is basically a test run for the Riker-Troi relationship that we will see in The Next Generation, but again, as with the movies' version of Kirk, even though Ilia talks about "oaths of celibacy" and humans being "a sexually immature species", her relationship with Decker within the movie itself consists essentially of verbal allusions to a PAST affair.)

The Next Generation-era series and movies have been more explicit about the sexuality, and have moved things along for the franchise as a whole: Riker and Troi sharing a bath in ST:I, Riker and Troi making love (and then the villain psychically projecting himself into Troi's mind so that the sex becomes a virtual rape) in ST:N. The Borg Queen's come-ons to Data in ST:FC are also somewhere in that ballpark, and probably go further than anything we saw in the original-series movies.

On top of all that, there is the fact that one of the whole points of J.J. Abrams' Star Trek is that "it won't be your daddy's Star Trek." The sexuality stands out just as much as the old-style speeding car, and just as much as what looks like a swooping hand-held shot on the bridge, etc. The aesthetic is all different now, and that's as true of the depiction of sex as anything else.

Keep in mind also this quote from Mark Harris, which I quoted at my blog back in June:

Here's a genuinely surprising piece of news about the summer of 2008: In a season expressly designed to appeal to the hordes of kids who are out of school, two of the kiddiest movies so far, Speed Racer and Prince Caspian, have fizzled. And next summer, and for several summers to come, there'll be fewer kids going to the movies, because there'll be fewer kids, period. Apparently (this is the U.S. Census talking), we had a mini-baby boom between about 1981 and 1995. And then came a dip — a substantial dip — in the kid population. In other words, that mammoth group of youngsters that has reliably fueled movie grosses for almost 15 years is now looking less kidlike: They're between 13 and 27. And getting older. And looking for movies that appeal to them. And they're really not going to like being called a niche.

And he wrote that before The Dark Knight came out and became the second-biggest movie of all time.

So, yeah, kid-friendliness is not necessarily a plus, these days.

FWIW, I mentioned this stat when I was writer-in-residence at a Mennonite high school last week, and one of the teachers chimed in and said that, yeah, there are twice as many Grade 12 students as there are kindergarten students these days (at least in our neck of the woods), so there could be big changes ahead for educators, too.

The trailer is now available on Apple's site, along with an HD version. And here's a shot-by-shot breakdown, if you're feeling particularly nitpicky.

FWIW, that shot-by-shot walkthrough of the Trailer is so wrong, it's kind of laughable. It mis-identifies characters, ships, and locations pretty badly. The trailer itself is pretty doggone awesome.

That seems like a remarkably unconvincing argument.

So you had fizzles in two of the "kiddiest movies so far," Prince Caspian, an okay adaptation of a children's book with a fan base that isn't wild about the movies, and Speed Racer, a semi-ambitious but rather muddled adaptation of a kiddie cartoon with no particular fan base to speak of.

On the other hand, you have hits like Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and the National Treasure movies, the Pirates of the Caribbean and Spider-Man films, all of which have broad appeal from family to teen and young-adult audiences, and no overt sex.

This seems to me a credible template for a successful Star Trek movie. I'm not saying "Make it the kiddiest of kid movies." I'm saying, you've got a hot property that appeals to grown-ups but that parents would enjoy sharing with their kids. Why not leave the door open to family audiences?

I don't think we're going for The Dark Knight here. (FWIW, as mature as that film is, there's no sex in it, either.)

SDG wrote:
: This seems to me a credible template for a successful Star Trek movie.

Perhaps, though you've got only one PG example for that template (i.e., the National Treasure movies, which frankly got just a wee bit sexual for MY tastes in its second installment).

: I'm not saying "Make it the kiddiest of kid movies." I'm saying, you've got a hot property that appeals to grown-ups but that parents would enjoy sharing with their kids. Why not leave the door open to family audiences?

Well, as per all the skimpy outfits on the original series -- and as per recent movies such as Star Trek: Nemesis, which features the psychic rape scene -- the Star Trek franchise has always had a bit of a sexual edge. So I can't really hold this against it.

FWIW, my two older boys are seven (almost eight now) and ten. I showed them both National Treasure movies, though for the second one we did have to discuss the morality of cohabitation. They've also seen all three Spider-Man movies and all three Pirates of the Caribbean movies. They have of course seen Raiders, and we just watched Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. (Temple of Doom is not on the horizon; I'm debating what to do with Last Crusade.)

We did just watch Iron Man, with one strategic remote-control edit: the early bedroom scene is conveniently at the end of a chapter break, so our viewing cut right from Tony propositioning the reporter to her waking up in his bed. It's obvious what happened but the erotic imagery isn't there. It's still a little over the edge of my comfort level, but FWIW both boys declared emphatically and on their own initiative that Tony was a jerk, so I thought the moral point was pretty clear.


I think I'm pretty typical of a lot of American parents of pre-teen kids. I'm willing to deal with my kids watching skimpy outfits, and I don't mind romantic tension and an erotic subtext. Women pulling off tops and getting horizontal in bed with men goes further than I'm willing to go at this point. Star Trek: Nemesis is not a real typical touchstone.

SDG wrote:
: I think I'm pretty typical of a lot of American parents of pre-teen kids.

No doubt. But was Star Trek made for pre-teen kids?

Okay, granted, the fact that the first motion picture -- the one with Ilia talking about her previous relationship with a "sexually immature" human being, the one in which Kirk's own girlfriend dies in a transporter accident (and the novelization tells us how Kirk's pants got a bit tight when he was talking to her before that point) -- did have a McDonald's marketing tie-in. (I believe I still have the box from the Happy Meal that my dad bought for me on the way home from the theatre.) But then, so have a lot of other movies.



: Women pulling off tops and getting horizontal in bed with men goes further than I'm willing to go at this point. Star Trek: Nemesis is not a real typical touchstone.

Fair enough, but surely the regular TV shows have gone this far before, even if the "typical" movies haven't?

I think TOS was watched, from its original run, by whole families. I know as a kid in the 1970s I watched it in reruns with my parents and grandparents. There was always an undercurrent of raciness, but not beyond the comfort level of typical American families.


It doesn't stand out in my memory of TOS, TNG, DS9 or Voyager. Kirk of course got the alien babe all the time, but onscreen there was only ever kissing. In Next Gen Data and Yar were "intimate" (Data's word on a later occasion) in an early episode when a virus ran amok on the ship, and I seem to recall a bit of Klingon foreplay in an episode or two. But while the women's outfits might be provocative to begin with, I don't really recall clothing coming off or horizontal action in bed. Maybe a morning-after scene here or there.

It does seem to me that Enterprise may have gone a bit further in this direction, but Enterprise never really caught on and shouldn't be anybody's template for what Star Trek should look like.

Also, FWIW, I think the typical movies generally fit a similar mold. Wrath of Khan requires viewers to be able to deal with Kirk having had a child out of wedlock (and not knowing it), and in Search for Spock young, rejuvenated Spock is going through Pon'far and Saavik apparently has sex with him, though it's so subtle that I initially had no idea what was happening. There's a bit of typical Trek raciness in The Undiscovered Country, but nothing like a bedroom scene.

SDG wrote:
: In Next Gen Data and Yar were "intimate" (Data's word on a later occasion) in an early episode when a virus ran amok on the ship, and I seem to recall a bit of Klingon foreplay in an episode or two. But while the women's outfits might be provocative to begin with, I don't really recall clothing coming off or horizontal action in bed. Maybe a morning-after scene here or there.

Well, I only watched a handful of TNG episodes here and there, but I vaguely recall Troi and/or her mother appearing naked (just out of frame), and Q appearing naked (just out of frame), and Picard appearing naked (on-screen, seen from behind), etc. Picard's nudity was in a torture scene, and the others' nudity was handled in a more comic vein, but for the moment, I can't think of anything particularly erotic -- apart from the more provocative, suggestive stuff like Yar's outfit when she comes on to Data. (Since that was only the second episode of the entire series, it was one of those things that gave me pause when TNG first got started; I was a 17-year-old Bible school student at the time.)

: Also, FWIW, I think the typical movies generally fit a similar mold.

Well, yeah, like I said, they deal with Kirk when he's middle-aged and looking back on his relationships, rather than young and passionate and engaging in those relationships.

As for the Vulcan subtlety of ST3:TSFS... well, Nimoy, who directed that film, has always been about the subtlety.

In any case, all your examples of "typical" Trek movies date to the TOS era, which ended 17 years ago. The TNG movies have definitely gone at least as far as the trailer for the new movie goes.

Only Nemesis, AFAIK -- the last and possibly the least of the TNG movies, and the movie that essentially killed the franchise and brought us to where we are now. That's like looking to Batman and Robin as a precedent for Batman Begins.

COME ON!!! IT'S TIME FOR NEWER! SEXIER!!!!!

But seriously, I finally watched the trailer. At first I saw the Uhura removing her shirt and thought people were exaggerating...then I saw the jumping into bed. I admit it is hard for me to think about it from a parental aspect, I have no kids, so my notions of where the line gets crossed gets slightly hazy at times. And my only annoyance with sex scenes is they tend to bore me and I feel like the story halts. I wouldn't miss em, but at the same time, I don't find myself having the same reactions parents I know do.

As for the trailer itself...seriously? First time I have been excited about Star Trek in years. I really loved the use of the original logo.

SDG wrote:
: Only Nemesis, AFAIK . . .

You don't count the shared bubble-bath sequence in Insurrection that I mentioned earlier, then? Are you only focusing on scenes that give us actors in a horizontal position, with or without their underwear?

Granted, Insurrection is a "lesser" movie too, though it is, perhaps, more "typical" of the Star Trek shows produced during the 1990s.

Oh my goodness, Dirty Harry makes a point that hadn't occurred to me yet:

Damn them all to Hell, Kirk isn’t supposed to know how to drive a car.

He's absolutely right. Remember that scene in 'A Piece of the Action'?:

(Grinding) "Oops! Gears!"
"Yes. Oh... I believe they had a device known as a... clutch. Clutch, captain. Perhaps one of those pedals on the floor."
(Kirk shifts the car into gear)
"I kind of like this. I'm going to get one myself."
- Kirk and Spock, on their first attempt at driving an automobile

"Captain, you are an excellent starship commander. But as a taxi driver, you leave much to be desired."
- Spock

"Must we?"
"It's faster than walking."
"But not as safe..."
"Are you afraid of cars?"
"Not at all. It's your driving that alarms me."
"I've got the hang of it now."
- Spock and Kirk, before another try at an automobile

There are a number of issues like that. The Enterprise is supposed to be constructed in orbit, over San Francisco. Kirk only met Captain Pike once, when Pike was promoted to fleet captain. Kirk served on the Farragut as his first ship as a lieutenant and a cadet. And on and on.

So, I'm thinking of this as a reboot. Reboot. Reboot.

In principle, I would tend to distinguish the two, yes. In principle -- it would of course depend on the specifics of the scenes in question -- it seems likely to me that a bubble-bath scene could easily be more within a range of developmental appropriateness for preadolescent (or adolescent) children than a scene with a woman lowering herself onto a man (or vice versa) in bed.

If I try to analyze it further, it seems plausible to me that (ceteris paribus) depictions of relaxed, presumably post-coital intimacy presents less of a problem than depictions of arousal and foreplay. In connection with this, being (non-explicitly) naked seems less direct, or explicit, or something, than the act of getting naked (even if similarly non-explicitly).

THAT'S what has been bugging me about the trailer.

I couldn't put my finger on it, but Kirk driving the Corvette seemed very wrong. I kept thinking that it had something to do with the age the car would have to be for Kirk to drive it, although I could conceive of multiple ways that could be explained...

He hasn't driven an automobile yet.

Geek points to Dirty Harry. Now get over it, y'all.

Yeah...I have to admot...I just didn't care. Or maybe this is the Trek Fan version of Greedo shooting first.

Nezpop wrote:
: Or maybe this is the Trek Fan version of Greedo shooting first.

Heh. Admittedly, with something like 700 episodes and 10 movies to date, Star Trek has had many, many opportunities to contradict its own continuity already; thus, many of the extra contradictions that are added to the mix by this new movie won't be all THAT big a deal, really. Star Wars, in contrast, lasted for only six movies, so there weren't all that many opportunities for the series to contradict itself -- though George Lucas certainly gave it a go, especially with the prequels!

What *I* want to know is whether the scenes set in the 24th century will be consistent with what we saw in Star Trek: Nemesis (which, like the new movie, also concerned a renegade Romulan) and the final episodes of Deep Space Nine and Voyager. It's one thing to say that all the 23rd-century stuff looks different now because of the complications to the timeline that are introduced in this movie, but it would be nice if they could at least START on a familiar note.

The comic-book prequel that was announced a month ago or so now has a poster:



Looks like they might keep the TNG-era stuff stylistically consistent with the last few movies, at least. (Is that Data, or B4? Not that it matters much, since Nero here appears to be younger -- and free of tattoos! -- so it is quite possible that the comic-book storyline will take place before Data's death in Nemesis, while the prologue to the new movie will take place some time afterwards.)

I remain curious as to what Spock will look like in the actual movie itself. (And no, contrary to what a number of bloggers have said, that is NOT the Old Spock with Winona Ryder in the trailer. Rather, it is Ben Cross -- the guy who played the Jewish runner in Chariots of Fire -- playing Spock's father, Sarek. Ryder, of course, is playing Spock's mother, Amanda.)

Click here to compare Spock 2008 with Spock 23rd-century 1991 and Spock 24th-century 1991.

AICN has a new trailer, slightly different from the last one... but with one whopper of an addition at the end.

Yeah, that's the video that I embedded in the previous post ... though for some reason the YouTube clip doesn't show up in this thread now, even though space has obviously been made for it. Huh.

It's Spock! I mean, Spock Spock! THE Spock! Spocketty Spocketty Spock Spock!!



Is it just me, or does the Spockification of that trailer (I mean, the REAL Spockification) multiply the coolness thereof by a factor of, like, infinity?

CrimsonLine wrote:
: Is it just me, or does the Spockification of that trailer (I mean, the REAL Spockification) multiply the coolness thereof by a factor of, like, infinity?

Possibly. I'm a little alarmed by how much older he seems here, though, compared to his last appearance on Star Trek: The Next Generation. Spock should be about the same age as Sarek was during the original series, right? He should be middle-aged, not a senior-citizen, as Vulcans go.

Unless, I suppose, Spock comes back in time from an even LATER point in the future than we suspected ... or unless, I suppose, he went back even FURTHER into the past and then lingered there for a while before meeting the characters in this film ...

FWIW, further to my comment about Spock's and Sarek's respective ages, Memory Alpha indicates that Spock was born in 2232 and was last seen in 2368, at the age of 136, while Sarek was born in 2165 and was first seen in 2268, at the age of 103; he eventually died in 2368, at the age of 203. Seventeen years have passed since we last saw Spock, so he could easily be 153 now, if this movie is keeping pace with the 24th century the same way the last four films did.

Memory Alpha also has some interesting details on Spock's activities AFTER his final appearance, when subsequent episodes of TNG and DS9 did (or didn't) refer to him and his movement on Romulus:

In his later years, Spock went into semi-retirement, choosing to act as a Federation ambassador (much as his father had done). His last known whereabouts were on Romulus, acting to facilitate Romulan-Vulcan reunification. Captain Picard met Spock on Romulus and informed him of his father's death. The two mind-melded, allowing Spock to realize the depth of his father's feelings for him. (TNG: "Unification I", "Unification II")

In 2369, Spock was involved in an incident of "cowboy diplomacy" in which Deanna Troi was temporarily kidnapped to help with the defection of three Romulans, including a senator, to the Federation. (TNG: "Face of the Enemy")

When an unknown person was beamed on board the USS Enterprise-D in 2370, Ben told a few junior officers that he heard that this was Ambassador Spock. Moments later, he told the others this was only a joke. (TNG: "Lower Decks")

As far as it is known, Spock remained on Romulus after 2369, but neither he nor his movement appeared to surface during the Dominion War, nor at the time of the Battle in the Bassen Rift.

The "Battle in the Bassen Rift" is a reference to the climactic battle of Star Trek: Nemesis. I know some fans were a bit miffed that that movie concerned major, major developments on the planet Romulus -- such as the sudden assassination of the planet's entire government -- yet never made any reference to Spock's political movement there.

It will be interesting to see how much of this continuity is acknowledged in the new film.

Is it possible to be an unexpected side effect of the rapid aging that occurred in Search for Spock? Maybe his aging only appeared to have slowed to a normal pace...and it is having an impact in his later years?

Is it possible that it just has to do with the fact that Leonard Nimoy is freakin' old?

No.


I was addressing the age issue within the context of the series continuity. Tossing out theories.

Nezpop wrote:
: Is it possible to be an unexpected side effect of the rapid aging that occurred in Search for Spock? Maybe his aging only appeared to have slowed to a normal pace...and it is having an impact in his later years?

Ah yes, that possibility had occured to me too, but it slipped my mind by the time I wrote that post.

Buckeye Jones wrote:
: Is it possible that it just has to do with the fact that Leonard Nimoy is freakin' old?

No, the makeup goes much further than that.

Of Trek and Timelines [possible spoilers]

Includes: how to avoid the "Grandfather Paradox"

Awesome.



I particularly get a kick out of the way they have Captain April's face speaking Captain Pike's dialogue. (April was the first captain of the Enterprise, before Pike, Kirk, Decker and Spock.)

It's a strange, strange world we live in.

Wery cool.

JJ Abrams posted a note at the movie's Facebook page yesterday saying the movie will basically be done, done, done by next week -- sound mix and all. And then, he says, "we're going to flash-freeze it so it's totally fresh for you in May."

I guess that's better than, say, the fact that Wolverine (another movie coming out in May) is going back for reshoots next month, despite being in gestation for so long, etc. It suggests a certain confidence, and a certain preparedness, on the part of Abrams and his crew.

But I dunno, after growing up on stories of how the original Star Wars movies were finished at the last minute, and watching Peter Jackson's crew members freak out as they got down to the wire for The Lord of the Rings and King Kong, the thought that Abrams will be finishing this movie FIVE MONTHS before its release, and will be making absolutely no more tweaks to it during those five months, doesn't seem right.

I say this, of course, as a guy who is so accustomed to filing articles a few days (or less) before they are published (whether online or in dailies/weeklies), that I have a really, really hard time trying not to think about those articles or essays that I've written for magazines and books -- outlets that don't publish until weeks or months after you've finished the work.

I also say this as one who can remember when this movie's release date was GOING to be Christmas Day, i.e. this Thursday. But Paramount decided months ago to push it into the summer, because they figured it would find a bigger audience then. And with all these blizzards, who knows, they're probably right!