News of the original Spock (Leonard Nimoy) joining a new Spock (Zachary Quinto) in J.J. Abrams’ new Star Trek movie was big news around the world. All the major news wires (AP, UPI and Reuters) ran with the story – getting the story into hundreds of news outlets such as CNN, The Guardian (UK), and even Forbes. It was also covered on some TV shows, including a debate segment on G4’s Attack of the Show.
If this is such big worldwide news with the announcement of Nimoy, i can only wonder what the buzz would be surrounding it if Shatner was coming back as Kirk.
Great that Trek is finally back in the news and in a positive light.
Very True, bd!
I saw some of the G4 segment from Comic Con, and one fellow was unfairly bashing the new film (saying things like, “Nimoy gets to flash back in time and see how bad an actor he is” and things like that).
Some of the G4 stuff was not at all necessary, and if you’re going to bash it no matter what, or not be open minded, you shouldn’t be talking about it.
Get rid of the bearded CHUBBY FAT ASS on that G4 video segment.
The man doesnt know what he is talking about. MI3 was MUCH better than MI2. JJ Abrams will do fine with the new Trek movie.
Oh I know thats the FAT ASS from CHUD.com I use to go to there site but stopped after they would not stop mashing Trek.
As I have said for many years now, the return of Kirk + Spock makes Star Trek an event again.
Did the last couple of TNG films or last several series generate this kind of buzz?
It is now a must get Shatner back in the fold. His return will bring tons of media attention + good will to the project.
guys…although I do not agree with Devin from CHUD, there is no need to get personal. Have you looked around your avg Trek convention?
i’m sure Trek Life character will agree with more Green skinned Women (will Jennifer Garner wear that makeup?). The middle guy was fairly negative about abrahms. those other articles show what a treat this site is.Keep up the good work Anthony. ps Happy belated Birthday Wil Wheaton and check out my Kirk actors in the Robbie Wlliams 2 thread
It’s pretty obvious that in order for the Trek Franchise to continue and be successful it’s going to need a new creative team behind it. To bad it took a long time for the franchise to get it. Enterprise and Voyager could had been ten times better with the right people behind it. I’m not saying those series was bad but it could had been a lot better maybe with Ronald. Moore and Manny Cotto at the helm of each show.
Well, I\’m fat and hairy. Let me tell you straight from the Iphone in my pants… chicks dig fat and hairy.
– EDITED-
NOTE FROM AP: Hitch you can come back but not back to your old ways
Anthony, I agree that name-calling is weak. But, there’s little defense of putting these guys in a position of actual critical reviewers. They barely seem to know the subject matter. They’re celebs only in an age of way too many media outlets. Critics (worthwhile ones) should offer insight. Roger Ebert gave one of the most scathing reviews ot Trek ever. I also remember his glowing reviews of TWOK and TVH. In all cases, he offered perspective and analysis, not just throw-away glib remarks, like these guys.
(Ebert correctly labeled Nemesis “a copy of a copy of a copy.”)
The fat guy in the video uses words like “poo” and “doodoo”……hardly anyone worth listening too….
that guy from CHUD is an ass.
What I want to see from this movie are deep underlying themes. such as star trek 2: young vs old; life vs death; friendship; love; hate
I also want to see less exploring. it’s been overdone with star trek. It’s getting to a point where I want to see how all these planets of the federation interact with each other. why does it seem that 95%+ of starfleet is human? do these other worlds have their own limited militaries? what happens when there is a war?
I want to see a war, damnit!!
#7 … I have to give credit to VOODOO here, I have in fact read this very same thing from him on many sites over the years. And I always knew he was correct.
All the news coverage this early on is a *very* good sign. I’m really curious what the box office for this might be like. I asked for speculation in another thread and no one guessed. Nemesis tanked so bad that it was surprising; I wonder how much our Trek can rebound?
Thinking ahead a bit, just imagine how exciting (and newsworthy!) it will be when the first new images of Leonard Nimoy as Spock since 1991 appear! I can’t wait! :)
And oh, lest we forget…BRING BACK KIRK.
Yeah, that CHUD guy is an ass. MI3 was pretty much the best of the series. It focussed on Character…which is something Star Trek has been missing out on for years now. Sure..the spectacle of it is important too…but it shouldn’t over shadow the characters like the last few films have. Down with the fat guy…he’s an idiot.
Interest this high in Trek is unprecedented imo, given we are still 16 months away- maybe TMP,TVH AND Generations created as big a buzz?
What do you guys think?
There were also Spock stories in the Chicago Tribune & Globe and Mail — great to see all this media attention. This is definitely huge coverage for being this far out.
Generations had great advance buzz (including a TIME cover that I still have), but that was mainly because of the pairing of Kirk and Picard. None of the other TNG movies did — I recall when Nemesis was released, and some of our friends were completely unaware of the movie a week before its release!
PS – Yeah, that CHUD guy was awful.
There’s no need to pre-emptively defend Abrams, Quinto, or the film fellas.
If the work has merit, it will speak for itself and silence naysayers.
If the work is subpar, it will be a breeding ground for ridicule.
I honestly didn’t find Nemesis that bad. It had some pretty good development for Picard. The whole Data thing was bogus though, like WTH… theres another Data? Now if it had’ve been Lore instead of B4, that woulda been fun. Two opposites fighting our Enterprise crew. The only problem was, the editing was horrible. I found Nemesis was like Star Trek 3, in that it was a good little movie that got the point across, but ultimately lead to something else. Definitely not the way to end it. Its all in the editing, because theres no way a writer like John Logan came up with crap. I mean, seriously, who hires an editor who admits that editing movies is his passion, to direct a big sci-fi epicish movie?
Nemesis suffered from trying to be a movie we’d all already seen and seen done a lot better – namely Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan – which completely played into the (correct) public perception that The Franchise was worn out, its creative people were burned out, and they were just cranking out the same product year after year.
Having said that, it was a pleasant surprised to see so much positive press about the Star Trek movie, as opposed to “oh God, not more of this again” which seemed to be the flavor of Star Trek media coverage from about 1997 or thereabouts. And whoever asked above, yes, Star Trek movies used to be fairly big deals, back in the TOS film days. There was great anticipation for STTMP, Star Trek II was very popular, there was a lot of anticipation about Spock’s return and Nimoy directing Star Trek III, and Star Trek IV was pretty much carried out of theaters on the shoulders of cheering crowds.
That fat guy was a tool.
This is the first time I’ve ever heard someone say MI3 was worse than MI2.
I thought the consensus was that MI3 was a vast improvement over the prior film. The reason it did poorly in the box office had more to do with Cruise’s antics than the film itself.
# 4& #5- You’re both totally right,
Re the comments on G4 from that “Chubby Fat ass”?
“Nimoy gets to flash back in time and see how bad an actor he is”
I like that reporter better the future, when he is the older, wiser and smarter…
Kevin Smith.
Some of these comments, and the language involved, kind of makes me wonder if the people issuing them are aware of the concept of difference of opinion, or proper debate etiquette, for that matter.
Star Trek’s had its detractors since Day One, and they, nor their negative statements ever stopped it. There’s no need for all of this fuse-blowing over nothing, name-calling and crying havoc. If they don’t like it, so what?Who says they have to like it? No matter how they express it, that’s their right, and jumping all over them is not only juvenile, but pointless and ultimately self-defeating, especially in the eyes of people who will be the ones to make this film a success, or just another footnote in the long list of failed remakes that self-imploded at the Box Office.
I’m sure that Groening is already working on working this whole business into an episode next season. Probably McFarlaine, too!
I don’t understand how someone can be so utterly wrong and have a job as an entertainment critic or reporter.(Chud.com guy)
Nimoy has always been regarded as a fine actor.
MI-3 was by far the best of the series.
JJ Abrams CAN do the job!!
He was at least correct that Star Trek needs to be BIG. Regardless, I Still don’t care much for that dude.
Anthony- Thanks for the great work on this site and for the coverage at Comic Con.
Will you be doing a post Comic Con article. I guess there’s not a lot to add. But perhaps a word on the experience or the level of excitement about the Trek news?
I am only slightly amazed at the coverage. We are fans of a phenomenon in the entertainment industry. It has sired movies, books, 5 other series based on the same universe, comics and a lot more. And now the original characters return in the original time period… after 40+ years to build on their adventures.
Very few stories…. modern mythology… can claim this longevity or fan loyalty. We all can like different facets of the Trek universe, but there has to be a special niche for the one that started it all.
The likes of Nemesis wasn’t even a blip on the radar really, this film is going to be something special, I can just feel it, really hehe.
Wow, that video is just more proof that ANYONE can be a media player in this Internet day and age. All it takes is,,, ummm, well, I can’t tell from watching them what it DOES take, really…
Shatner_Fan_2000 # 16
Thanks for the kind words.
To me this isn’t rocket science. From a purely commercial point of view Kirk + Spock are clearly the way to go.
They are cultural icons. You just don’t throw them away and assume you can put the name Star Trek on a new series and that program will continue to thrive.
Roger Ebert said it best when he said Star Trek had become a copy of a copy of a copy. It had lost the passion Shat +Nimoy brought to it.
Overtime the program lost what made it special. If they went with a new cast ST XI would have been just another ST film with just another cast.
Now we get the best of both worlds. We get to see Nimoy (and maybe (fingers crossed) Shatner) one more time in their iconic roles. Plus, we are reintroduced to the iconic characters with new actors who can carry the franchise forward.
It’s a no brainer.
Nimoy and Shatner will give this project a credibility it could never have without them.
I always thought Nimoy’s acting in anything was pretty damn good. That slam really was baseless in my opinion.
I finally saw MI3 on DVD a while ago. I thought it was good. Like 3 out of 5 stars. Certainly not “awful.” I still have not seen MI2. MI-one was ok, but I still remember being disappointed that they made Voit, who was playing the Peter Graves role, into a villain. Talk about non-canon…. but I digress.
My point being–that guy was wrong. And I know, grownups should not call names. So, um… I won’t. But it’s hard. :D
Personally, I loved Nemesis. I may be the only one, but I thought it was terrific. Of course, my favorite Trek film is still TMP, so I am well aware that no one agrees with me.
That said, every critic (on Tv, radio, etc, not the fans) who shredded Nemesis did so not because it was a copy or it had bad acting, or any other legitimate reason. The only real complaint I heard was “10 movies? How can it still be good after 10 movies?” Which is bullshit. Bond has 22 and they’re still good. Nemesis was good too. Maybe not the most original, but still very good.
As for the MI series. I liked the first one best. I thought the third one was the weakest link. Not because it was bad- because it certainly wasn’t- but because I just couldn’t get it out of my head that the main villain looked like SNL’s Stuart. Gosh darn it, people like him.
Regarding the Chud guy – people don’t get on TV as “commentators” these days for having civil, constructive discourse delivered in a reasonable manner. They get on TV by being loud-mouthed provacateurs who shoot their mouths off to shock viewers and generate conflict. Its how CNN and the other so-called news networks operate, and I’m sure a tiny outfit like G4 follows that example.
Breaking up my rant. Sorry.
I think that the media frenzy about Trek 11 shows that Paramount was full of horta shit when they declared Trek dead because no one cared about the franchise any more. I know a lot of folks that didn’t have UPN. And UPN also sucked.
My 2 cents was Enterprise took a few too many liberties with continuity, but was still the best hour of TV when it was on. It was a great show but on the worst possible network. You put that same show on Sci Fridays and its a huge hit.
It didn’t get solid rating because UPN stunk the joint up with its programming and it followed Voyager, which ran every Trek fan I know- including myself- off from Trek after about 2 seasons.
(Personally, I always thought Voyager was an extremely poorly written show. Even fantastic FX and solid performances could not save it from massive turkeys like that episode with Amelia Airheart, or any episode that had Q in it or any epsiode with the Kazon. Or that last episode. I mean, WTF?!: I think the last episode of Voyager stands as the worst Trek ever filmed. Come on- where’s the continuity police on this thing?! Janeway violates the Prime Directive and the whole vision of Trek by commiting an act of GENOCIDE (!!!!) against the Borg and violates the Temporal Prime Directive all the hell over the place. And she’s a hero?)
ZoomZoom # 19
I could not disagree with you more.
Star Trek (the original) was a huge deal.
Star Trek was/is a cultural phenomenon. The characters have become part of the cultural landscape.
For Christ’s sake, NASA named it’s first space shuttle after Kirk’s Enterprise.
People seem to have forgotten how big Star Trek was and what an impact it had.
TMP was the #2 film of 1979 (for comparison sake Transformers is looking to be the #2 film of 2007)
All of the TOS films (when box office is adjusted for inflation) made well over 100 million. Even the horrendous Star Trek V.
On average they were more popular than a modern day 007 film in the US.
A Star Trek film was a huge deal. That is easy to forget in an era where Nemesis did not even make $50 million in 2002 numbers. Or Enterprise could not attract 2 million people per week for free.
Star Trek is not a niche sci-fi program (like Firefly that runs on the Sci-Fi network) This is Star Trek which at one time had legions of fans.
It’s fall from grace was hard to watch.
That is why Paramount is bringing it’s big guns(Kirk/Spock) back to revive the series
They now understand that it’s the characters and the actors who played those characters that made ST special. Not simply the name ST and interchangeable (and in many cases bland) characters
Kirk and Spock are Star Trek to the vast majority of the public. They are the series best (and only) hope of survival, and tptb know it.
That’s why we are getting a Kirk/Spock Star Trek XI.
This was a LAME article. LOL!!!
Trekie 33years:
No offense (this is not an attack on you) but, don’t you get it? Nobody cared about Voyager or Enterprise.
UPN had nothing to do with it. There was no interest in those programs. They were living off the name Star Trek. You could have put those series on at 9:pm between Friends + Seinfeld and nobody would have watched them. They are passionless copies of the original.
Nemesis (I am a big TNG fan) was an unwatchable film. For God’s sake It was the second film in a row where Data broke out into a song and dance routine.
How did ST go from the great “Wrath of Khan” to singing + dancing robots covering Irving Berlin tunes? Give me a break. The series was a shell of it’s former self at that point.
Paramount is correct in their current assessment of Star Trek’s audience.
The one and only thing (except the few hardcore fans that will watch anything ST) people care about in the ST universe is TOS and Paramount knows it.
That is ultimately why you will see Nimoy AND Shatner in this film. Paramount will be going all out to save it’s one time cash cow.
The interview was fine with the exception of the arrogent jackass (the fool on the right), who was obviously anti-trek to begin with. What a moron!
I think JJ will do just fine. The fact that Nimoy is still in after reading the script is a very good sign.
trekkie 33 years
I have wracked my brains for hours (ok, not hours)…
Trying to figure out WHAT common denominator Nemesis and TMP have.
Then it hit me.
It’s Bald People.
You like Bald people.
Actually Ilea/Khambatta was quite the hottie, so I’ll give you a pass.
(I would have watched Phase II just for her).
But the dude who played ‘lil Picard? eh- not so much.
Timothy Dalton looks (and sounds) a lot like Patrick Stewart, and bald nor not, I would have believed him in the clone role.
Sorry this is off topic. Anyhow 2 of 3 dudes on G4 seemed psyched –
(So I guess The New Trek will only make 185 million instead of 200 to pander to every last cranky perfectionist Kevin Smith lookin’ geek.)
PS If they want to bust on bad acting as a Vulcan why don’t they pick on T’Pol?
lol. Bald! That’s it!
Actually, TMP was great SCIENCE FICTION. Thta’s the #1 problem with current Trek. It has become its own genre. Instead of telling compelling sci fi, they tell action packed Trek. TOS and TNG were more science than Trek.
As for Nemesis. One word:
Romulans.
I am a Romulan nut!
PS-
#41- OV-101
you are clearly king of all Trek geeks with your Nasa inspired moniker.
Kudos. I wish I’d thought of it.
I have to agree, to a certain extent, with those who didn’t like Enterprise. It was the first ST series I had the opportunity to see from the beginning, but it lost me after Saeson 2. It got so bad at one point, it nearly killed my love of Trek. Thankfully, things finally seem to be moving in a positive direction for the franchise.
#42: I do think that Jolene Blalock seemed bored in her role as T’Pol, but then again, no one ever quite portrayed a Vulcan as well as Nimoy (though, personally, I think Mark Lenard came the closest).
Seeing that G4 piece really makes me miss TechTV.
..while pondering why the latter TNG movies tanked and why TOS is back with a vengence keep in mind two old sayings.
“Familiarity Breeds Contempt” TNG and the copies of the copies of the copies had grown far too familiar and wore out their welcome.
TOS….for the most part neglected during the Berman regime….was tossed to the back burner while many new 24th century fans, in allegiance to their more realistic, polished Trek, enjoyed poking fun at the old relic, with it’s cheezy sets and over the top style. TOS was off the radar for a long long time…a fun novelty of the 60’s, but no comparrison for the newer slicker spin-offs that had the best resources at their disposal. Little did anyone realize that the love of TOS never went away, it was simply pushed far back into the closet…out of sight, out of mind. But as they saying goes…. “Absence makes the heart grow fonder.”
Those who remembered the imagination, the fun, the in your face music, longed for a return to the adventure that brought them into this universe to begin with. TNG onward created a void. It was Trek, but it wasn’t. It was a STar Trek, not THE Star Trek. Thankfully, JJ Abrahm’s was one of those missing the fun.
God, we’re back to playing “my Trek’s better than your Trek”.
ok trekkie33
But I must reming you that the bar in Nimbus III had a Romulan, but that dindn’t make it Mos Eisley
Actually (and again off-topic)
The TMP story concept idea had been kicking around Roddenberry’s brain (and his scripts vault) since his “Planet Earth” series pilot(s).
I think Dillon Hunt (The Kirk factotem) was originally supposed to confound a returning Voyager probe. (Perhaps by showing it Diana Mudaur’s two mutant belly buttons)
Jeez! just how many pilots did Roddenberry produce in the 70’s anyway?
Shatner fans,
While I have been advocating a “wait and see” on Shatner’s possible inclusion in this film, I am going to suggest that if we don’t see an announcment within a month or six weeks, you best get used to a Shat-less Christmas in ’08