There should be a good bit about this already in the blogosphere, but I want to go ahead and throw in my two cents. Watched the new Star Trek a few hours ago. It plays like a slightly more enjoyable Transformers, throwing in some of the substance of the original for good measure. Definitely the best of the Star Trek films. Didn't take itself or the mythos too seriously, light on its feet. By the time we get to Simon Pegg as Scottie we know this is mostly a wink and a smile, with echoes of (dare I say it) Starship Troopers, but more fun.
There is a small debate in geek circles as to whether this new film means Star Trek edges out Star Wars for Sci Fi supremacy after the abysmal Star Wars Prequels. I haven't been as into the genre lately as much as when I was a child, but back then I pitched my tent waaaay more on the Star Wars side. Given its mythological bent, Star Wars was a sprawling epic with magic, romance, heroes, transcendence, redemption. It captured the imagination. Meanwhile the USS Enterprise chugged along like an elaborate science class. Indeed, clearly the underlying epistemology of Star Trek is Enlightenment based scientific exploration, rather than Tao and destiny and all that. It's left brain vs. right brain. Fast forward 25 years (just like in the movie!) Star Wars and Jaws pretty much ushered in the era of the modern blockbuster. Since the late 70's movies have steadily become more corporatized, with tie in's galore. By the time the SW Prequels rolled around, Star Wars had become far more than a cottage industry, with action figures, comic books, books, video games and all manner of interstellar bric-a-brac. Not only Star Wars, but Lucas had become his own brand, tied to THX sound, and an industry leader in special effects, Industrial Light and Magic. The Star Wars prequels disappointed on many levels, because, in more ways than one, it was all about the numbers. It was as if the production companies, the marketing machine, the military-industrial complex of planet Lucas needed more grist for the mill. The problem was, Lucas would not relinquish "creative control." The result was three unwatchable mish mashed movies full of extremely crisp sound, images shot with a brand new crystal clear digital camera, in which all the Storm Troopers suddenly had Australian accents (oops, better go back and change the originals) and there were multiple annoying "convenient parallels" (read: lazy writing). Perhaps most annoyingly, we had shifted from a spiritual context, in which you must "feel the force flowing through you" (methinks Lawrence Kasdan's line, for some reason) to a scientific one. Instead of mystical mythology, you had to get your midi chlorian count read, like a diabetic taking blood sugar levels. The soul of the film had been removed, reduced to the measurable, observable. A limitless galaxy full of mystery reduced to a Cartesian grid. You half expected Spock to show up in the background somewhere, sneering. What mattered was not mystery, not heart, but numbers, box office numbers, video game tie in sales, DVD units. Like the hero turned villain of the films, the story had become more machine than human - self-perpetuating, gobbling all the dollars it could. In an ironic twist, the villains of the film became a metaphor for the franchise itself.
If that's what became of Star Wars, what then can we say of Star Trek? Magic and mystery had always captured my imagination more than a group of acquaintances floating through space in a giant Bunsen Burner. If the conflict of Star Wars is overcoming the evil within, the conflict in Star Trek seemed to be staying true to a scientific ideal and, on occasion, allowing your humanity to shine through, in spite of the superiority of logical mind. In the movies, heroism and self sacrifice always played a larger role than in any of the TV shows (although, admittedly, my knowledge there is limited). The stories always seemed too thinly allegorical, too dry. To remedy this, J.J. Abrams decided to throw in "a little rock and roll" into Star Trek, and there he succeeds.I wonder if some of Star Trek's charm over the years has been precisely its dryness, its commitment to utopian idealism, to a scientific worldview, to its dorkiness. A purist might be torn. On the one hand, a beloved franchise is injected with freshness, but at the cost of its very uniqueness as a niche market. Its very dryness perhaps inspired its cult following. Don't get me wrong, the film was enjoyable, but clearly created to be palatable for mass consumption. It has all the bells and whistles, is extremely fast paced, features a young, sexy cast to draw in the teen crowd, and the teen dollar. And as marketers know, grab the teen dollar and the rest will come. I wonder if alongside the corporatized branding that proved to be Star Wars' downfall, we haven't seen another trend leading to the homogenization of the American blockbuster: the cult of cool. But for a few recognizable features, this could be Transformers III, it could be GI Joe 2: Return of Cobra (both franchises that showed up in the previews). Sleek, action packed, witty, testosterone-fueled, and an attractive male lead with a rebellious streak. I'm not sure that's a bad thing. I certainly shelled out my $9 to go see it. I might even do it again. I just wonder what's being lost in the process.
