Many fans of the new Star Trek movie still have questions and yesterday the screenwriters answered a few at a screening, we have details on that below. Plus Trek had another leggy day on Wednesday at the Box office. We have all that plus a new make your own T Shirt contest and a couple of new Star Wars looks at Star Trek.
Orci & Kurtzman respond to issues
Although the new Star Trek film has got mostly rave reviews in the mainstream and nerd media, there are some issues that many have brought up, including reviewers here at TrekMovie. Well there was a special screening of the Star Trek film last night in LA arranged by Creative Screenwriting Magazine, and Bob and Alex attended and answered some questions. Our friend Mojo has a blog about this event, here are some highlights of what the pair had to say [SPOILERS]:
- Deleted scene showed Corvette was George Kirk’s and little Jim stole it because abusive step dad was going to sell it [note: this scene is in the book]
- Winona Kirk was in Starfleet (explaining why she was on Kelvin)
- Kirk’s coincidental run-in with Spock Prime on Delta Vega was example of fate trying to bring them together (was covered in script at one point) [see TrekMovie interview which covers this]
- Deleted scene explained Gaila the Orion helped Kirk cheat on Kobayashi Maru
There’s more at Mojo’s blog from O&K, including talking about Uhura & Spock and even lens flares.
Creative Screenwriting should also be putting up a podcast of the event, we will link to that when it is available. Bob and Alex are also featured in the cover story of the current issue of the magazine, here is the cover.
Bob and Alex in Creative Screenwriting
ATTN LA Writers: Attend ‘An Evening With Kurtzman & Orci’
If you want your chance to talk to them, next Tuesday the WGA is holding a ‘Writers on Writers’ talk and reception with Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci. They will talk about their careers and projects followed by an audience Q & A. The event is on Tuesday, May 26 at 7:30-9:30pm at the Writers Guild Theater (135 S Doheny Dr., 90211). Tickets are $20 (with discounts for WGA members and studets). More details at wgfoundation.org.
Box Office: Trek 6 day total matches Wolverine + weekend estimates
Star Trek brought in $5.8M on Wednesday, bringing its six day domestic total up to $99.0M. Even though Wolverine had a bigger opening weekend, Star Trek’s stronger weekdays have been enough to essentially match Wolverine’s six day total of $99.1M. This must be especially gratifying to Paramount as some early reports suggested Wolverine would make twice as much as Trek. Box Office Mojo is also reporting Star Trek has brought in over $42M in International sales so far, bringing the total take to $141.8M (note international data is not as up to date and Trek has yet to open in some markets).
With the good word of mouth keeping Trek buoyant, the next question is how well will it do in its second weekend when it faces off against Angels & Demons. Today on Twitter there was a bit of chatter amongst some movie site mavens about whether Trek could actually get a second number one weekend, with Cinematical’s Erik Davis predicting a Trek winner. But that seems unlikely. Although prognosticators assume Angels & Demons will win, the Box office Mojo Derby has Trek bringing in $38.5M, and BoxOffice.com predicting $42M.
There is one indicator already, as Fandango has announced that Angels & Demons is currently accounting for 46% of sales, with Star Trek accounting for 42%.
Make your own Star Trek T-shirt – win a prize package
Searching for the perfect Star Trek T-Shirt? Why not design your own and win some prizes. Yerzies, the site that promises you to ‘make it yerz’ is another new Star Trek licensee and they are running a contest to promote that where you can submit your own design for a Star Trek T-Shirt. The 10 best finalists will be chosen in two weeks and all of those will then be available for purchase. A winner will be chosen later based on sales and the designer gets $500 in Star Trek prizes. You can submit your entry (and look at the other entries so far) at yerzies.com
Finally: Star Trek v Star Wars
We heard a lot from the filmmakers about how they wanted to bring some Star Wars into Star Trek, and a new video at College Humor looks at just how far they went…
And if that isn’t enough Star Wars and Trek, then there is this…
He didn’t cheat, he “changed the conditions of the test.”
Got a commendation for original thinking
Okay, so maybe there we SOME parallels between the two franchises.
Funny stuff!
LOL
1st !!!!!
Can we just drop this whole morphing of Star Wars with Trek? If I want to see something on Star Wars I’ll go read a Star Wars fan site.
Just got the book today, haven’t started reading it yet though. I’m really interested in the deleted scenes. This is the first I’ve heard of the Gaila scene…I wonder how she helped him?
Pretty interesting Star Wars/Star Trek comparison.
My friends who are not Trek fans all agree that there was a lot of Star Wars influence in the Trek film.
I have to admit to seeing it too.
5 does not equal 1.
Kirk: I do not believe in the no-win scenario.
Got me chills when he said that in the new movie
The trek is on! Watched it three times already, but I want more!!
\\// from Jundiaí, SP, Brazil
^Gaila might be a proficient programmer.
-cs™
The Star Wars comparison could be extended to the young hero lost and running from monsters on a snow planet until an old friend rescues him and tells him was he has to do next.
It’s relevant because JJ Abrams is known to be a bigger Star Wars fan than a Star Trek fan. The comparison film illustrates the common “hero’s journey” mythology of these two films.
1 – THANK YOU. Represent.
And re: SW vs. ST. I love it. Is that the best they can do? A stationary Enterprise target sitting there? Please. The Enterprise alone would destroy the entire Imperial Navy. Transporters, folks. And a ton of other things.
Yeah, the camera panning along the underside of the Kelvin’s hull in one long take at the beginning of STXI, left me shaking my head as the movie started – I didn’t buy a ticket for Star Wars.
Okay, I loved the movie… but I got a question that maybe someone more clever than I can answer. How could Kirk and Scotty beam aboard the Enterprise from Delta Vega – half way across the galaxy? I know Spock gave Scotty the formula but, if they could transport at that range why the need for starships? Why a Star Trek to begin with? Am I missing something and wouldn’t that undermine most of the plots on ALL the various series and movies? I’ve read lots of questions about the different details but this seems to strike at the heart of the basic tenants to me. Okay, more than one question.
the star destroyer would have no only destroyed the enterprise but the planet as well. but kirk would have just wapred away and not sat there like DUMB ass… aaannnd then the storm troopers would have been screwed lol
the enterprise didnt trvael half way across the galaxt. it would have taken them about 100 years to do tha considering the milky way could be like half a million light years in diamiter. it probably traveled about a light year or a sector away
Doesn’t anyone writing articles here know how to spell-check their work? It isn’t rocket science.
I don’t know what ”boyount” is and I most certainly don’t want to hear a movie review by a ”moth.”
Writers of a high school newspaper have more professionalism.
#1 — not in the Abramsverse, he gets captaincy straight from cadet for his reward. Which teaches him nothing.
I’m glad Bob Orci is still out there answering questions for us fans. I love this film; I’ve seen it numerous times and will see it again. But I have one nagging question, or problem: when the Kelvin and later the Enterprise are under attack, and the helmsmen claim “the shields are at 32%” for example, incoming debris and weapons smash the ship as though there were no shields at all. Shouldn’t they bounce off or be deflecting until the shields were no longer there? This really bugs me for some reason. Anyway, I look forward to some creative answers. And this being my only issue, obviously this is a truly remarkable film. Carry on!
#17 Right. I believe the Milky Way is 100,000 light years across. Delta Vega is near the edge of the galaxy according to WNMGB. It seemed to take minutes to reach Vulcan from Earth in this movie, no? Spock saw Vulcan implode from Delta Vega, right? It took Kirk sometime to hike 14 kilometers with Spock prime to find Scotty and devise their plan. So I imagine the Enterprise has covered some serious ground at high warp in that span. See my point? And even if it only went a light year, that would still change things significantly wouldn’t it?
The parallels between Star Trek and Star Wars just show how iconic both are. Both take from Greek legends, Shakespeare, etc. Both touch our hearts.
Personally, I would love for someone to get the ball rolling on nominating Leonard Nimoy as best supporting actor . Whereas Pine and Quinto share the job as lead, it is Nimoy that brings it all together and really supports the film and the transition from old to new. I know sci-fi and fantasy has a difficult time at the academy awards but that glass ceiling was chipped by “Return of the King” and Heath Ledger.
I don’t know about anyone else but after seeing Star Trek I don’t have a need to see any another movie for the rest of the summer. Summer time is the time I am always at the movies. And there looks to be a lot of good entertaining movies this summer. But after seeing Star Trek I am done. Angels and Demons and Terminator Salvation, just don’t interest me at all. Speaking of Box Office, I can not remember where I read this article I believe in it was in the Hollywood Reporter. But they were saying that in order for Paramount to make a profit from Star Trek, the movie would have to make over 600 million to break even. I am not in the movie business but that number seems kind of high to me. I know a lot of money goes into making it and promoting it. I figured if Star Trek broke past 300 million then it would be fine. Over 600 million to break even? I am just wondering if anyone knows if the math on this is correct at all?
Re: Kobayashi Maru
I’d like to see the bit with the Orion girl most of all; it might help explain how the “original thinking” commendation came about. Because, as it stands, the whole sequence feels like forced humor … the post-Kobayashi Maru responses on the part of Spock and whoever that guy was standing with him are inexplicably mystified.
In this version of the story, Kirk didn’t program the simulation to allow for some tiny loophole he could exploit in the heat of the action and get away with it … He was basically just sitting there with that shit-eating grin on his face, munching his apple doing the equivalent of playing a videogame in God Mode, all cheats obviously on. Original thinking? Maybe apples are fiendishly hard to come by in 23rd-century San Francisco :)
One of the laudable achievements of this film is the conscious decision to make other Starfleet captains look competent, instead of falling back on the old “make other captains look dumb to make Kirk look clever” gimmick. But it seems to me that the gimmick wasn’t really discarded – just pasted over to Starfleet Academy :/
So I do wonder if the cut scene with the Orion girl sheds any light on that …
So thats why he stole that vintage c2, god that thing had a great engine note.
I hope that Star Trek makes more money than any other movie this year.
Yeah okay so some stuff matches up, but the difference is Star Trek was way better.
#26 – why?
I just returned from the theatre, this is my sixth time seeing the movie. I loved everything about the movie except one thing, engineering. I was in the Navy for ten years on older ships. The USS Gridley’s engine room was more modern than the Enterprise’s and it was built in the 1960’s.
This note is for JJ, Alex, Bob, and Dave. You all had many specialist and scientists on set for consultations. Why didn’t at least one of you visit on of the newly built aircraft carriers or power plants. Even visting a modern cruise ship’ s engine room and control rooms would have given you a better idea of what an engine room 150 years in the future might look like.
Sorry to rave on, but I feel this is the weakest area of the movie and I’m not the first to say so.
Hahaha see Star Wars cn’t stand on it’s own without ripping off from Star Wars, hahahahah!!!
14 I think it’s a record. We got all the way to 14 posts before someone added their 2cents worth of anti trek. you are allowed your op/ed but get a job for goodness sake I can’t be on here all the time to dispute you! I have to go to work tomorrow if you wan’t to fight about canon ect you’ll have to wait cagmar… unless someone in another time zone can carry the torch…..
Hahahaha see Star Trek can’t stand on it’s own without ripping off from Star Wars, hahahahah!
#32: You got us. Just please don’t shoot us with your Proton Torpedoes ;)
20, when the shields were at 32 percent, by design there were certain parts of the ship that were more protected than others so that those areas could be 100% protected. For example, the bridge is always the most protected part of the saucer, and the engines are the most protected part of the secondary hull. They are the last to give out, since the destruction of the bridge would mean the death of the command crew and thus the probable loss of the entire ship.
The Enterprise’s artificial intelligence system automatically diverted shield strength to those areas in most need of it, meaning that certain areas deemed less critical were unprotected.
This is also why the crack in the viewscreen/window was not actually as dangerous as believed. For one thing, the viewscreen is made of a transparent duranium alloy that is actually stronger than the nontransparent variety. (Notice that the Enterprise viewscreen did not need to be polarized or unpolarized, unlike the Kelvin’s.) This is also why the viewscreen cracked only after the dome of the bridge had already done so. For another, the bridge is protected by multiply redundant shields whose power reserve is virtually limitless, provided that there remains any power aboard the ship at all. Even multiple direct hits by a weapon that would otherwise penetrate other parts of the ship would have little effect on the bridge itself.
I’m glad they are answering questions about plot holes. As much as I’m a fan of “less is more”, this time a few more bits of dialogue migh have gone a long way.
I’ll have to read the book.
Going out this weekend to catch ST again and combat some of that Angels & Demons popcorn.
14. Sorry you didn’t like it cagmar. I absolutely loved that shot.
It’s not the same as the Star Wars opening. That was a long pan to emphasize how huge the Star Destroyer was. The long pan along the Kelvin had the radio chatter and sonar sounds that connected it with our modern world, and glances of people working through the windows. Made it very human, and brought me right back into Trek’s future of exploration and boldly going.
George Lucas stole many ideas from Star Trek too.
Gary Mitchell shoots lightning out of his hands, Apollo the greek god etc. in Star Wars The Emperor does the same thing.
Green dancing slave women.
Moving objects with your mind. Multiple Star Trek episode. Called The Force in Star Wars.
Many of Lucas ideas borrowed from other things. The beat goes on.
I’ll still take Star Trek over Star Wars any day.
ORCI/KURTZMAN WROTE: “After being rammed by the Kelvin, Nero’s ship was crippled; a convoy of Klingon Warbirds captured the crew and held them in a prison camp for all those years. Eventually the Romulans escaped, reclaimed their ship, blew up 47 Klingon vessels and returned to their mission”
REALLY!?!
SERIOUSLY!?!
So the Klingons end up with a Federation Starship AND a super advanced 24th Century spaceship and have the Romulans in a prison camp. So unlike Enterprise’s “In A Mirror Darky”, the Klingons make no advances in 25 years of their own technology with it actually in their hands, yet the federation with merely a data core makes advances in leaps and bounds? What, were the Klingons too busy trying to figure out who had the biggest bat’leth?
REALLY!?!
And then the Romulans, not genetically superior augments headed by Kahn, but jsut some Romulan guys overpower the Klingons (OK, I’ll give ’em that one as much worse has happened in Trek before), but on top of this feat they actually get their ship back and manage to repair it to destroy most of the Klingon fleet to get away?
REALLY!?!
Why wasn’t the ship completely dismantled for its secrets like the Tholians did in “Mirror Darkly?” Or did the Klingons repair technology over a century beyond them, so it was in battle ready condition for the Romulan’s escape?
SERIOUSLY!?!
The massive plot holes in this explanation are worse than the question of what they were doing for 25 years. No wonder they cut it out of the movie. No wonder it confused the audiences who screened it.
REALLY!?! WOW.
I was a S/W fan when I was a kid the new movies didn’t do anything for me until ani became DV. That was cool. This new ST movie is incompareable to syar wars … what are you thinking?Just because there is an excellent space battle doesn’t mean we have to compare to star wars. In the Kelvin scene in the 1st 10 mins. It’s emotional beyond anything in SW…right?
I just got home from the Star Trek movie at IMAX in the Silver City complex in Ottawa.
The 7:00 p.m. IMAX screening was sold out tonight!
The 9:45 p.m. IMAX screening where my friend and I watched was 3/4 full.
Actually Star Trek came BEFORE Star Wars, so maybe Lucas ripped off his ideas from TOS?
#15 had a GREAT point, worth repeating. I wonder if the writers thought about this and what they would say:
” I know Spock gave Scotty the formula but, if they could transport at that range why the need for starships? Why a Star Trek to begin with? Am I missing something and wouldn’t that undermine most of the plots on ALL the various series and movies? I’ve read lots of questions about the different details but this seems to strike at the heart of the basic tenants to me.”
I also have my own concern, but I think I know what the answer might be: Because Spock Prime,-129 years older than Quinto’s Spock -is around, this renders all the Enterprise’s voyages moot. Spock prime knows how to handle The Doomsday Machine, The Whale Probe, Nomad, you name it. I wonder if Starfleet will be reduced to hauling grain for excitement.
I suppose the answer is that there is still the original timeline, where these threats/challenges exist, but they are just minor nuisances in the new timeline, where Spock Prime can just tell them how to handle them.
Ok, now lets talk about the next Trek! What possible story can they come up with? Gotta be Klingons involved… or Q?! That would be weird.
I really would never, ever use Box Office Mojo’s Box Office Derby number for anything like a prediction. It’s a game where random people can pick numbers out of their ass for predictions, and that includes me.
#42 – NO. You are not missing anything. Rodenberry knew the dangers of the transporter, but they had to use it to facilitate quickly getting from point-A to point-B. Though the later incarnations seriously abused it, even TOS found they were writing themselves into an ever precarious box each time they used the device to narrowly escape death.
For Orci/Kurtman/Abrams to write themselves into such a compromising position from the beginning sets up some complicated canon expectations which they must begin negating even before they start writing the sequel. Sadly, this is one of the many “way-cool” cheats that Abrams availed himself of which do nothing for the longevity of the franchise.
Star Trek vs. Star Wars.
Apples vs. Oranges.
WHO CARES?!!!
#44 Restoring the timeline? :p
Never Q. Abrams has no idea of how to direct deLancie.
I just saw it today.
As an old (and jaded) trek fan, I give it 4 stars. It might be the best trek movie yet made, imho.
I don’t understand how anyone could think this movie is somehow a disservice to the franchise. Nemesis, Insurrection, Generations, Final Frontier, Voyager, Enterprise… these were disservices.
This is the trek movie I always wanted. I have some reservations, but overall I couldn’t be happier with what they’ve done. When I think of how much trek I’ve seen that just meanders on lamely, spewing meaningless technobabble and rehashing the same stories the same way over and over again… this was a breath of fresh air. Can’t wait for the next one.