Nerd Culture - A Golden Enterprise: 50 years of Star Trek

Fair Warning: If you aren't a fan of "block of text" posts or Star Trek this post isn't for.
Forgive me my nerd indulgence. :)  I'll try to find a nice meme or apropos Garfield next time.

Space, the final frontier, these are the voyages of the starship Enterprise.  It's five year mission...now reaching the 50 year mark.

Fifty years ago today, the crew of the Enterprise first hit the "small screen". (A term that used to mean TV but today better refers to a phone or watch of some sort.  But I digress.)

Nerd Nation hasn't been the same since.  In the days before the immediacy of email, social media, online polls, and live streaming, and the ability to organize allowed by fan sites, message boards, and subreddits,  Star Trek fans were able to flex their collective muscle to save their show from cancellation through a concerted (snail) mail campaign and then continued to keep the flame burning through pre-photo copier fanzines,  The fandom grew through nearly unprecedented syndication viewership.  Oh, and their passion basically invented the modern fan convention scene.

Future editions of the franchise spearheaded the practice of shows being first released in syndication (Next Generation) and as the cornerstone of a broadcast network (Voyager on UPN, which ironically became part of the CW network that now has almost an entire lineup of geeky shows).  CBS will try to use a new Star Trek show to drive its online streaming network early next year.

But that (along with the progressive casting choices) is the meta.  This is about the personal.

For me it was about the ideas.  Don't get me wrong, I've grown attached to the characters. I still get misty-eyed at the end of The Wrath of Khan.

But the voyage into the unknown, new life forms, the interplay of ideas and philosophy, that was for me.  And yes, I hear some of you yawning about how slow some of the plots were.  And chuckling about Spock walking around without his brain or the giant space amoeba.  Or lamenting some of the inconsistencies from episode to episode.

But for me I settled in for each to episode to see what's next, what's new.  It's best summed up at the end of The Motion Picture when Kirk is asked for a course and he leans forward and responds with an awed and reverent "Out there!"

That's why the original series and The Next Generation pulled me in.  (And other series continued.)  What's out there? And what will we discover about ourselves? 

The universe is not only stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we can imagine. (A quote or variation of which has been attributed to J.B.S. Haldane, Sir Arthur Harrington, and Werner von Heisenburg.)

I also like the hopeful and positive tone of the Star Trek universe.  The idea that humanity can create a society where basic and even some advanced needs are met, where each individual has both the means and desire to pursue their highest level of achievement in science, art, philosophy.

I hope fifty years from now, we're closer to that future.  I firmly believe that whether we are or not, Star Trek will be there.

Thank you, Mr Roddenberry.  And to all those who have made this franchise come alive.

Star Trek Sunday

So Epix Drive Thru Channel was showing a marathon of TOS* Star Trek movies today.
*(The Original Series - Garrulous Greg)

Watching The Motion Picture reminded me have much I loved the original Star Trek series.  And watching The Wrath of Khan and The Search for Spock made me realize how different the old guard films were from the current versions.

Yes, yes, go ahead and laugh at the old special effects.  And I know even old school Trekkers pan the length and plot of The Motion Picture.  But that movie and others in the series were 'bad' for one reason only -- they tried to take a classic Trek episode style plot and somehow meld it with the sensibilities of blockbuster sci-fi movies.

The first series wasn't about gadgets and space battles.  The tech served as set dressing, a way to show viewers this is the future, and occasional plot device. (transporter, Mirror Universe, any questions?)  The battles, and tension leading up to them, served the story.  Blockbuster movies serve these things up as visual eye candy, whether there is purpose or not.  Star Trek in it's original conception is a philosophical series, defined by commentary on what are the best of qualities of humanity. It's idealistic, thinky sci-fi.  A true to form TOS movie would be the science fiction equivalent of the historical period piece movies that tend to suck at the box office by take home critical acclaim.  The Motion Picture tried to be both, and did neither well.

As for new series vs old, look no further than the last parts of the second movies of each.  In both The Wrath of Khan and Into Darkness a main cast member dies saving the ship.  But in Khan this death holds resonance because of the relationship of Shatner-Kirk and Nimoy-Spock.  A relationship seen across 100 hours of Star Trek.  The funeral and final scenes are schlocky to those without this emotional connection.  Into Darkness doesn't carry the same weight for simple reason that Pine-Kirk and Quinto-Spock have known each other for only 4 hours of screen time, and for much of that time despised one another.  The relationship between Spock and his brother suffers the same problem in the TOS movie The Final Frontier.

No doubt the current Star Trek films will be better at the box office.  Their conceptualization is built as a blockbuster action movie franchise rather than a sci-fi exploration of the human condition.  And there's no shame in that.  But at this point in the relaunch, there is not sufficient underpinning for moments like the destruction of the Enterprise in The Search for Spock, which for this old Trekker was every bit at poignant as the death of Spock.

I leave you with a few quotes that even today, 30 years later in some cases,  strike an emotional chord with me:

Well, Bones, do the new medical facilities meet with your approval.--They do not. i'ts like working in a damn computer center.
Mister Sulu, you may indulge yourself.
I have been, and always shall be, your friend.
What have I done. -- What you always do. Turn death into a fighting chance.
Of all the souls I've encountered in my journeys, his was the most...human.