Great Links: Get Out The Vote Edition

Well today is election day in the US and so we have our last round-up of Trek-related election links. Plus we have a photo trip into Trek history, Lutherans for Trek, John Hodgeman’s Trekexpertise, Trek on the lists, a famous viral video working its way into a Trek viral video, and so much more.

The Last Trek The Vote
Today is election day in the US so it looks like we can finally wrap up the Star Trek connections to Politics, with just a few last stragglers.

ToyCyte reports on some custom Barack Obama figures, including one with a Trek theme.

GOP Presidential candidate, Senator John McCain traditionally spends election days going to the movies. Comedy Central’s Indecision 08 Blog is recommending some movies for the Senator, including a Trek movie. From the post:

Star Trek: First Contact: That pretty Borg Queen reminds him of Cindy

At a campaign rally yesterday, GOP Vice Presidential candidate Governor Sarah Palin seemingly made a plea for some Trek aliens. From an article at MSNBC:

It was at a San Francisco fundraiser earlier this year that Obama got into trouble, suggesting rural voters “cling to religion and guns” because jobs were being lost. Palin referred to them Monday as “bitter clingers” and “cling-ons.” (There goes the Star Trek vote?)

Friend of the site Ed Gross sends in his latest comic from Media Geek, which takes a look at Sarah Palin and asks her the toughest question at all, dragging her into the Star Trek v Star Wars fight.

Can Palin answer the real questions fans want to know?
[click to see full size]

Lutherans inspired by Trek
Eric H. points us to the cover story of this month’s Lutheran magazine, the magazine for members of the Lutheran faith. The article is titled To go where  we’ve never gone before. The story covers the decline in congregations, but the article’s author looks to the final frontier for hope, writing in part:

Today many churches across the country face decline—even death. How do we deal with this challenge? Where does the ELCA find hope for the future?

Trek’s James T. Kirk was my hero when I was a boy. His passion for exploration and the uniting of all inhabited planets throughout the galaxy touched me deeply. Although the TV series died, it later returned as feature motion pictures.

Apparently God does need a starship

Pictures of the week – Trek history from LA Times archive
The Los Angeles times Hero Complex blog dove into their photo archive and came up with some great old photos from Star Trek’s history. Here are the three images, with informative captions (written by TrekMovie’s Resident Trek Historian John Tenuto).

1968 NBC Star Trek Cancellation Protest: Although the 1968 fan protests against the cancellation of Star Trek are well documented in prose, there are very few photographs of those days. This 1968 photo by Harry Chase for the LA Times is a gem because it details the zeitgeist of this unique fan era, from fan clothing to signage. This is a photo worthy of inclusion in American television history texts.

1973 Animated Star Trek Cast Photo: The first photo of note was taken by Mary Frampton in 1973 for the LA Times during the Animated Star Trek era. It shows Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelly, and William Shatner enjoying themselves as they voice their characters for the show. The actors often worked on the show independent of their costars, although there were a few times when principal cast conducted their recording sessions together. Therefore this photo is of incredible value to fans and popular culture enthusiasts.

1952 Leonard Nimoy Photograph:  Leonard Nimoy is only 20 or 21 years old in this Gordon Wallace photo of the future Spock with costar Mona Knox from the film Kid Monk Baroni. Nimoy writes about this film extensively in his memoirs I Am Not Spock and I Am Spock.

Quotes of the week: Hodgeman knows his Trek
Daily show ‘resident expert’ (and co-star of the Apple’s I am a Mac/PC campaign) John Hodgeman knows all, or at least he pretends to. But he does seem to know his Trek. In an interview promoting his new book "More Information Than You Require" with Geekette Maureen Ryan of the Chicago Tribute, Hodgeman got onto the subject of sci-fi. From the interview:

We talked a bit about various “Star Trek” TV shows and how Ron Moore came from that tradition but went in a different direction with “Battlestar Galactica”: “One of the things that impressed me the most [about Moore’s ‘Battlestar Galactica’] was his real desire to approach TV in a different way, which was born to some degree out of his frustration with ‘Star Trek,’ where you obviously had story arcs and character development, but there was never any damage. The ship rebooted every episode. Even on a show like ‘Voyager,’ where they’re supposedly adrift without any resources. The ship would take damage and then be fine. [‘Voyager’] snapped back to a ‘Star Trek’ formula that had worked for that franchise and often worked quite well. [Mo here: Yes, nerds, in the course of this somewhat digressive conversation we did acknowledge that ‘Star Trek: Deep Space Nine,’ which Moore and other ‘BSG’ writers worked on, was the general exception to the ‘Star Trek’ rule in this regard].

“I’m not taking this opportunity to run down ‘Voyager,’ I’m just saying is that Ron wanted to tell as story where damage was done over time. Not just to the ship but to the characters. Not just external damage, like Saul Tigh losing an eye, but interior damage that those characters wore the way real humans wear damage. That’s the great opportunity about telling a long-form story, whether it’s purely episodic or whether you’re trying to tell some big story arc – you live with these characters for a long time. And when you live with people for a long time, you know they change.”

Fan Art Of The Week: The Great Trek Pumpkin
TrekMovie reader Ian P. sends a pic of his Halloween Pumpkins for 2008.

Trek Spooooooky

Video of the week: Klingons get what they deserve
YouTuber mjscarface looks to Star Trek III and sees the ultimate ‘gotcha’ moment for a viral video. 

QuickLinks

• Wired ranks Star Trek IV #3 on their list of 10 Geeky Movies That Should’ve Been Terrible, But Weren’t
• Kovels, publishers of the Antiques and Collectibles Guide, reports that "Captain Kirk" was the 10th most popular costume search on its website.
• Examiner.com’s Jason Roestel rank’s Chekov’s ear invasion in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan nuber 5 in his 10 grossest ear scenes in film.

There are 4 grosser ear scenes?