Shatner: Not Putting Me In Is Not Wise

It seems the ‘Shatner not in the new Star Trek movie’ story has worked its way into the mainstream media. The AP talked to The Shat today and he let it be known that he is not pleased that he has not been asked:

I couldn’t believe it. I’m not in the movie at all. Leonard [Nimoy], God bless his heart, is in, but not me. I thought, what a decision to make, since it obviously is a decision not to make use of the popularity I have to ensure the movie has good box office. It didn’t seem to be a wise business decision


Shatner of course is not hard up for work, with a spot on Boston Legal, a new book out (Collision Course) and narration on the upcoming Christmas Spoof “Stalking Santa” due on DVD on Nov. 6. “I’ve got a lot to do,” says the original Captain Kirk. However his disappointment at not being in the new Trek film seems genuine, saying:

Having been in on the creation of it, I was hoping to be in on the re-creation.

Of course there is still a ray of hope. As noted before, co-writer Roberto Orci stated that they still may decide to put Mr. Shatner into the film and that the decision may come after shooting starts in early November (the film will be in production all the way to March). Of course Shatner’s critiques of the film makers are likely not doing him any favors, and may become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

J.J., please end this
The above statements and Shatner’s other recent statements regarding the film should really put to rest any lingering doubts that his lack of involvement is some form of publicity stunt. News reported here or at ShatnerVision works its way around the ‘geekopshere,’ but AP articles end up in newspapers around the world and likely on TV as well (CNN, E!, etc). This seeming tension between Abrams and Shatner is not the kind of thing that Paramount publicity want. The AP article also discusses how at this summer’s Comic-Con J.J. Abrams left many in the media with the impression that Shatner would end up in the film. AP states that J.J. Abrams said Shatner would ‘probably’ end up in the film, but for the record Abrams didn’t actually say that. He said “We are desperately trying to find a way to put him in this movie.” However most reports took that as a ‘yes,’ which is why TrekMovie.com is on record recommending that Abrams himself make the final and definitive statement regarding Shatner…and hopefully do it sometime soon.

(source: AP)

UPDATE: Shatner on TOSR and the past
In an unrelated new article regarding Shatner’s new “Stalking Santa” DVD, there was this tidbit where The Shat was asked about the upcoming release of the digitally remastered Original Series on HD-DVD. Shat didn’t seem to know much about it, but went off on quite a tangent about the past:

I recollect them saying they were going to do that. You know I don’t collect those things. I’m sure they’re around somewhere but I never look back at those things. I don’t even take pictures. I’ve got all kinds of cameras, I love cameras but I find myself reluctantly taking pictures because what’s past is past. You can’t recapture it and I hear these heartbreaking stories of people who lose everything in a fire and the thing they most care about are pictures and I’m thinking, “Why?” The pictures remind you of something that can never be recaptured, the time is gone, the only thing you know is the present. That’s all that’s knowable and even the present isn’t knowable. The present becomes the past… so you really don’t know anything. Least of all, either seeing a picture of you when you were younger which is somewhat horrifying, or someone you love who was younger. I’m kind of trying to discover the answer to the mystery of why pictures.

(source: Movieweb)

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LoL!

Get the Shat in there…(in my opinion all the original cast should’ve found a spot in the movie)

If it fits with the film, get him in.

However, the film has to come first.

The man has appeal at his age. I do not think there is a sole on this planet who does not know who he is. He definitly would bring in box office reciepts more than Cruise would.

Put TWO tractor beams on that actor!

This is such sport for them. Lots of the fans would just like to know for sure. But, what do we matter?

QUIT PLAYING GAMES WITH MY HEART

Even in my heart I see
You’re not bein’ true to me
Deep within my soul I feel
Nothing’s like it used to be
Sometimes I wish I could
Turn back time
Impossible as it may seem
But I wish I could so bad baby

Quit playin’ games with my heart
Quit playin’ games with my heart
Before you tear us apart
I should’ve known from the start
Before you got into my heart

I live my life the way
To keep you comin’ back to me
Everything I do is for you so
So what is it that you can’t see
Sometimes I wish I could
Turn back time
Impossible as it may seem
But I wish I could so bad
You better quit playin’ games with my heart

Quit playin’ games
Baby, baby the love that we had was so strong
Don’t leave me hangin’ here forever
Oh baby, baby this is not a lie, let’s stop
This tonight

Baby, quit playin’ games
Sometimes I wish I could
Turn back time
Impossible as it may seem
But I wish I could so bad, baby
Quit playin’ games with my heart
Quit playin’ games
Baby, baby the love that we had was so strong
Don’t leave me hangin’ here forever
Oh baby, baby this is not a lie, let’s stop
This tonight .

best song for topic.

The issue that’s pre-occupied us has finally escaped into the mainstream. And as someone earlier pointed out, the question the general public will focus on is “Why not?”. JJ & Co. – you’re out of running room on this issue –

OMG, not again…………..

I couldn’t watch this film if Shatner wasn’t in it. God bless Nimoy… I love that he will be in the film, but without Shatner, I would feel hard pressed to go out and see this. It just wouldn’t feel right, and I would end up feeling angry that Shatner wasn’t in it.

Don’t get me wrong… I firmly believe this is a “one shot deal” for Nimoy, as it would be with Shatner if he is in the film. Any future movies should be with the new crew only, and not involve the original actors. But this film is clearly a passing of the torch, and to do it properly, I feel it needs both Shatner and Nimoy. This really is the last chance to get them both in a Trek movie together again. To only have one in the film is a cheat to the audience.

I want my Shat Attack value meal.

For the most part I dont get emotional about movies. In thi scase, I’m so upset I can’t find words.

Please put Willian Shatner as Kirk in this movie.

Paramounts got my money for tickets multiple times over if he’s in it. Do the right thing!

Peace.

Well…CNN put the AP story on their entertainment page…I have a feeling the question might have to be answered by JJ & Co. sooner than later..just to stop the questions from being asked so they can move on and make their film.

JCool — we haven’t had a good Friday night video on this site in a long time. This spoiled-rotten fan would like to see a new one.

hint-hint-hint

Doesn’t anyone else see this form of public lobbying as tacky and distasteful?

I love Mr. Shatner (Yes, love, I grew up with the man as my hero. Along side Christopher Reeve), and I know he (and his ego) is deeply hurt by the fact that the film can go on without him, but this public whining is so befitting of him and his character.

I am not use to seeing Kirk beg for anything, and this is a pathetic sight to be seen. If James T. Kirk can take falling off that bridge like a man then Mr. Shatner should be able to take the consequences of allowing that action to happen in the first place, like a man.

If this were Patrick Stewart or Brent Spiner lobbying for a part, you all would be having a field day shooting them down.

For all of you proclaiming that Shatner should be in TREK XI… or ELSE… please explain to the rest of us how you can adequately include Shatner’s Kirk into this new film without wasting pages and minutes of exposition about GENERATIONS and the Nexus, without making the general public’s eyes glaze over and the film itself grind to a screeching halt like a 2-ton mack truck of technobabble. I’m all ears.

14. DRE

I agree. I think that if this is going to be a Spock-centric story, and Shatner is anywhere near the set, it will become Kirk-centric. I love the Shat, but I think he should give Leonard his own spotlight.

Looks like the ‘shat’ has hit the fan now.

I’ve been reading these threads for awhile, but haven’t yet been compelled to comment. However, I must at this point go on record as being in support of William Shatner being in the movie.

Shatner must be in this movie. And, although I would settle for him playing Kirk’s dad or grandpa, it would be even better if he played the old Kirk. Others have put forth good arguments about why he should be in the movie, but I believe I have an argument that has not yet been offered…

I have high hopes that Chris Pine has the potential to be a good Kirk, and that he and the new cast can competently guide the Enterprise on to great new adventures. But… whenever I watch Chris Pine’s Kirk get in any danger, I will know that he will survive and live on… so that he can later die a meaningless death falling off a bridge.

You see, when Shatner made the mistake of agreeing to be in the flawed Generations movie, he agreed to kill Kirk… not just his Kirk, but Chris Pine’s Kirk as well.

If they don’t somehow undo Generations, then Kirk (whether it is Pine or Shatner) still dies at the hands of stupid Soran. Although Generations had some cool things about it, and had some potential, it is deeply flawed. Consider these facts, for example:
– Soran, Guinan, and Kirk originally get into the Nexus in a ship, yet Soran ridiculously thinks that the only way to get back in is to have the Nexus come to him on a planet.
– Soran’s rocket hits the sun as if the sun is an object just a few hundred feet up in the sky. The rocket doesn’t leave the atmosphere, go through space, then strike the sun. No, it just hits the sun in the blue sky like a bullet from a rifle might strike a flying duck. And of course, the nexus, which also appears as an object no farther from the surface than a cloud, immediately has its path changed by the absence of the sun’s gravity. All of this is absurdly stupid.
– Picard decides to risk Kirk’s life by pulling him out of the nexus at a time and place that is extremely perilous. Why didn’t Picard pull Kirk out a little earlier, so that they could destroy Soran’s rocket before he was about to launch it?
These are the things I think about when I think about Kirk’s death. And in the future, whenever I see Chris Pine beat the odds and come out on top against a nasty villain… I will always think: Okay, so he managed to get out of this one, but so what… The idiot Soran still makes him fall off a stupid bridge and die.

By no means do I think that they should refilm any Generations stuff… that should be left behind for good. But there are various ways to explain old Kirk being alive. The simplest way? … have a Snake Plissken moment. Someone could say, “I heard you were dead.” He could respond with a Picard comment: “Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated.” That would do it.

Please, I don’t want to think of Chris Pine’s Kirk as a guy who will one day fall off a bridge and die.

Lets clear this up! He took the part in Generations because he was trying to give the character a proper send off. Paramount, in their not so infinite wisdom, had decided to retire the Original cast. Berman and Co. decided to finish the job by killing off Kirk. Shatner, and everyone else, was led to believe that this was the end of the line for the Original Cast.

Now is the time to rectify this horrendous error in judgement by Paramount:

BRING BACK WILLIAM SHATNER AS CAPTAIN JAMES TIBERIUS KIRK!!!

shat is awesome but needs to let it go- agreed with 14 and 16.

Whatever pretense folks were making last week that the Shat is not campaigning in the press are thoroughly flattened by this story.

Doubtless someone can construct a superficially logical defense for the actor managing somehow *coincidentally* to go on in two interviews within two weeks about how he ain’t and how he oughta be in the Trek movie, but it failes the smell test. One really has to be drinking the Kool-Aid to buy into that.

There’s a bigger, more immediate, and more essential question created by this latest interview, however – and it’s one that we as fans can actually influence. To wit:

Will this be the Trekmovie Shatner thread that actually hits 1000 posts?

Shat-NER!
Shat-NER!
Shat-NER!

15 – If they put old Kirk in this film, they DON’T HAVE to explain it. Let that 500 page techno-sleeping pill be shunted to some lame-ass book tie-in. JUST let the movie be the movie.

Here we go again… I’m bowing out of this one early, as I can’t imagine that anything new can be said on this topic since 2 days ago…

This really bums me out. This could be our last chance to EVER see William Shatner as Captain Kirk. Please put him in this film.

For a man who spent half his career trying to distance himself from Trek, Shatner seems to be suddenly concerned about the franchise. I think he should just relax and enjoy his well-earned Emmys and keep kissing a*s on Boston Legal. Denny Crane is perfect for Shatner now; Kirk isn’t.

#14 “Doesn’t anyone else see this form of public lobbying as tacky and distasteful?”

No, you’re reading too much into it. I’ve you seen many Shatner interviews, you know his answers are always about 50% truth mixed with 50% hyperbole for effect. He’s not begging. He’s not boycotting. The man qets interviewed EVERY WEEK. People ask. He answers. He adds a bit of drama to make it all more interesting (recall his “screw Leonard, let’s get Shatner!” speeches at conventions during summer). And that’s it.

Mark my word … even if he isn’t in the movie, come X-mas 2008 he’ll be right there on the red carpet, mugging for the cameras with Pine.

#14 — I agree. Whether it would or would not be a good idea for Shatner to be in the movie is neither here nor there. But for Shatner to be lobbying like this — especially framing it as a “bad business decision” on Paramount’s part, which strikes me as disingenuous at best — just seems, well, sad.

OK,

I love the Shat as much as any Trek Fan, and would like to see him in the new movie if it can be done in such a way that we don’t waste precious time undoing what was done in Generations.

But with this movie we have a chance at a true return to the Star Trek that started it all–the original series. We’re going to see a new take on the legendary ship and crew that’s been with us for 40+ years and there are fans out there saying they won’t see this film if the shat isn’t in it?

PUH-LEEZE

We’ll all be there, and everyone knows it.

The answer is obvious: write in a scene in which Captain Pike has to be defended against court martial charges stemming from the Talos IV incident.

His defense attorney? “Denny Crane!”

#25 “For a man who spent half his career trying to distance himself from Trek…”

I don’t think that’s been true since about the 1970’s.

I knew this would happened. Abrams casting Nimoy in this movie an not Shatner was a mistake. He scould have hired them as advisors nothing more.

What’s up with Shat? It has appeared all along that this is going to start off as Post TNG, because of Nimoy being in it, going back in time to the beginning of their friendship. Kirk is dead Post TNG. I have a feeling that THE SHAT will appear in this movie in the end. It would only be logical if Spock has to go back in time, he will make certain Kirk will not be on the Enterprise-B. What do they say “Even bad publicity is better than no publicity at all.”

The Big Giant Head earns his name

I honestly think that the only thing more pathetic than the masturbating Shatner-worshippers crying about how ‘the Shat’ isn’t in this movie… is Shatner himself crying in the press over not being in this movie. It’s the equivalent of stamping your feet and screaming in the middle of the shopping mall until Mommy gives in and buys you your favorite toy. Doubleplus ungood, Billy; bad form. Have a little dignity, for God’s sake.

I said it before, just have Kirk show up with old Spock at the end and have so reprise of the aren’t you dead, I’ve been dead before line from ST2.

Never explain how Kirk was brought back from the dead, just have him there!

ShatFan
seriously? is that what you are going with here? He was asked? Did he have to answer? Did he have to attack Abrams? Do you really think he and his agent don’t know the decision is still pending? Of course he is lobbying and more importantly he is defending himself and HIS EGO.

cant he just say “no comment” or “I had hoped it would work out” and not all this ‘unwise’ crap? Does he really think this would help?

I love the Shat…I want Kirk in STXI! But this is just unseemly!

I’ll say this if there is no Shatner in this movie, then it BETTER BE AN ASBOLUTELY MIND-BLOWING SCRIPT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It WILL HAVE TO BE BETTER than anything we have seen in the movies and TOS COMBINED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It just will not work. Not as Kirk at any age, as Kirk died much younger than any Kirk Shat could pull off. The only way to avoid canon inconsistancies is to make use of the mirror universe, which has been well established through episodes in TOS, DS9, and Enterprise. Of course Kirk then would be a screaming, angry, and insane charactor, as he was in that universe. Much as Shat seems to be lately with his wining about the writers not wanting to throw in every cheap wink and nod to the audience, which would bring down the credibility of the whole film.

Leave it to Bailey to slice like a phaser beam right to the heart of this issue.

Of course, Bill wants in the movie, just like Leonard wanted into ST:TMP thirty years ago. The difference is that thirty years have passed and a number of bad decisions have been made regarding the franchise. Notice that word: franchise. As Paramount told Lucas in the seventies, “We have a space franchise”. This is (a rather large $) business decision.

We are fans. We can moan about it all we want. But in the final analysis this will be a business decision. It was made as certain way, Bill was out and he is playing the only hand he thinks he has. My opinion is that it is a bad one.

This recasting is what has been needed for a long time. Let’s wait and see. Can it really be any worse than “Q Pid”?

At the time of posting: only 973 to go, Dennis!

Shatner did one without Nimoy. Why can’t Nimoy do one without Shatner?

3 – I agree with you 100%. If it doesn’t work with the film, then I’m sorry, as much as I want it to happen, it shouldn’t happen.

Well said, DaddyTodd! Leonard and De bowed out of Generations because they didn’t want to play backup. Walter and Jimmy were all too happy to step in as I recall.

958 to go, Dennis.

38 ^ very happy I bought into ‘!’ stock.

Oh no….another thread creating the false dichotemy of shat lovers and shat haters. The real debate is between the tiny group that feel that shat MUST be in the film and the rest of us who would like it, but can live without it. Does that make us ‘shatner haters’ because we dont dictate to the film makers.

They have said they will try and work it out…and so that is good enough. Clearly none of us have read the script and so if he isnt in it, then he just didnt fit…enf of story. That should be enough for everyone…including Shatner himself.

I have to say that the way he has handled himself during this has lowered him in my eyes. I still love him, but jesus Bill….calling Abrams names…come on

I hope Shatner is in this movie, but wont cry if he isn’t

THIS TOPIC IS GETTING REALLY OLD!!

I don’t get it. The have a finished script, Shatner is not in the script. So, how are they going to put Shatner in the film after all? Mmmmm……. my bet is that they have more than one script in case Shatner is in.

Bill, you shouldn’t have accepted the part where they killed you off if you weren’t ready to stop playing the character.

That said, he’ll be in it.

46- Soup Nazi
what did BIll call him? I didn’t see that in the interview….

Personally I think Shatner’s getting way too greedy. He’s been the star of 7 out of 10 Star Trek films, isn’t that enough?

Kirk is dead. He should get over it!!

JJ and his team shouldn’t screw up their chance to re-launch the franchise just to appease Shatner and his fans.

I love Shatner (which ST fan doesn’t?) but come on everyone you’ve got to think with your head and not your heart.