Live Long and Prosper, Again, Star Trek!

Ok Mr. Anonymous of the Barbara Judith Apartments and Mr. Len Speaks, I couldn't wait. I did it. I had to do it. And I don't regret it. And I still plan on this weekend, maybe, but for me, it will be a necessary second viewing of "Star Trek". And a new generation it REALLY is! Thursday. A packed house. The Arclight. I think this is going to go through the roof! And for some reason, despite the fact that I will not in any way benefit from the financial remuneration, I am delighted. Please don't be mad, boys. Lest I explain myself. Well, I'll try anyway.

Time warp back to circa 1965 with me. "Oh, no, not again!" you might say. Come on, let's go just for a few minutes. I think we were there last week, when I was having a summer flashback. And one more time! Everyone at Mount Saint Ursula was already watching it, what is now known as "TOS", the "Original Series". I hadn't yet, but I was deatermined to do it, and one night caught the show about half way through. The first face I saw was that of the apparently slightly jaundiced Mr. Spock, in love with Leila and trying to get Jim Kirk to stay on Omicron Ceti III and live the uncomplicated life. The man had pointed ears. I was intrigued. That was the episode "This Side of Paradise" Captain Kirk got back to the struggle, costing Mr. Spock the love of his life.

I was an only, and lonely, child, not unlike a million other kids no doubt and so the fact that I developed a fantasy life in which the family of Star Trek, Kirk, Spock and McCoy, was my center, is probably no big reveal. Mostly Spock, of course, the alien, the alienated, fitting no where and wanting to fit somewhere but not able to say so and always trying to prove himself.. And their comraderie was one of which I could become a part, without judgment.

I never went to any of the conventions, and I never bought a phaser replica--not that I am incapable of it--but I was a rational Trekker. But I harbored the desire to see the series revive and when it did in 1979, I was happy, though disappointed by the product, which tried to do Star Wars and forgot the relationships that made the show unique, the thing that gave me a sense of hope during dark-ish times. There were only a couple of the movies that really worked after that, Wrath of Khan, Search for Spock, but mostly The Voyage home. But it didn't matter. They were back. And then more than a few died. First Gene Roddenberry in the early 90s, the Daddy of the enterprise and the Enterprise. Then Bones McCoy in the last of the 20th century. Then James Doohan, recently Majel Barrett Roddenberry.

Maybe that was part of the rush to go after work on a Thursday night. I need to know--would it be disappointment or a new lease on space fictional life? And I felt like maybe I'd be touching two parts of my life, the one from then, that little girl who had no idea where her life was going, and the one that is now, and merge them in some way, a way that made us both whole. I know. A little too existential over a sci-fi series. Maybe.

They had a task before them. Capturing a new audience that was not slightly intrigued by the cheesy inexpensive sets and camp from a decade they are a half a century beyond, and not alienating the boomers who took the canon to heart. It was unlikely they could do it.

But of course, idiot, there IS a way! I won't be a spoiler. And it allows them to use the canon and still change it with good reason, the best reason that there is! Deus ex machina it may be, but it allows for all new adventures, but with the relationships intact. With a bridge, a live bridge, between old and new, in Mr. Spock, Prime (the first Mr. Spock) who is definitely the wise, old Ambassador. Doesn't need the make up anymore. And, you can still have the modern explosions galore!

The actors work, at least to me. By the end, I was satisfied that this was the Enterprise crew, no less than their TV predecessors. And the Spock boys, what a good selection for a successor in every physical way. Even some of the deviations (let's just say Spock II has a better love life this time around) did not jar me. I heard a guy behind me while I was getting my parking paid, about my age, with two younger 30 somethings in tow, say that it was ridiculous that a 17 year old Russian (Mr. Checkov, adorably played by Anton Yelchin) was at the helm of the massive ship, and a guy just out of Star Fleet was being named the captain. But then, we do have 18 year olds in Iraq commanding battalions and saving at least a small part of the world. The movie presents the most heroic of their ilk, no? Myth always presents as bigger than our real lives. That's what attracts us so to it.

There were things at the beginning that tested my faithfulness, but then, as it moved along, I saw that the new had combined with the old and produced a Hollywood child.

Why did I have to have to see it alone, for the first time? I don't know in any certain way. I wanted to have the experience, good or bad, in my own world, my old one, my current one, without influence or contradiction from anyone I knew. And I wanted to like it, so I did not want to hear, just now, that they did not, if that were to be the case. Maybe I was going back to those old days, frequently alone with my own thoughts, and hopes, and dreams for something big and interesting, and heroic, and warm in a way that was just not possible in the Bronx in the 1960s, no matter how hard anyone tried. The audience was into it, and I liked being part of it, without judgment. Joy at the first "Fascinating" from Spock or the first furious objection of Montgomery Scott at being asked to give more of the Enterprise than could possibly be given, but he did it anyway. Or the first, "I'm a doctor, not a ____" (name the job) from Bones McCoy.

I hope I like it as much on the second go round I am eager to have, even if my friends feel it is not up to their respective standards. Maybe because it was a kind of lifeline to me back then, and an old friend now, that seems very familiar and comforting. They are my crew now, when I want to feel safe and full of possibility.