Oct 12, 2008 12:00 PM
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Tue Feb 9
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So we've been told that the writers of next year's Star Trek reboot want to "bring more Star Wars" to Gene Rodenberry's brightly-colored vision of America's interstellar tomorrow. But what does that actually mean? We've given it some thought and come up with five ways in which the crew of the Enterprise should model themselves after Luke Skywalker, C3-PO and company.
Make Your Heroes Less Perfect.
Rodenberry's future of humanity was a utopian one - We had all transcended racism, bigotry and hatred of almost every kind... we had evolved past the need for money, and worked towards the common betterment of society. We were, let's be honest, really kind of dull (Unless some outside force was making us insane/horny/whatever the plot required that week). Star Wars's heroes, on the other hand, were much more flawed... and much more interesting. Whether it was Han's gambling debts, Lando's willingness to sell out his best friend for the good of his well-lit city in the sky or just Luke's incessant whininess, we could see ourselves in the characters, and that made it easier for us to care about them. So let's see a Kirk that doesn't always save the day and get the girl, or a Bones that's the alcoholic that we always suspected him of being.
Less Talk, More Action.
Perhaps because of the show's budget, or perhaps because future humanity was so fucking diplomatic, Star Trek never really got into the whole exciting battle thing (Even later attempts like the Borg attacks in Star Trek: The Next Generation seemed half-hearted and slow). Sure, they managed to have a tussle every now and then that got our pulses racing -
- but imagine if that awesome Alexander Courage music was being used for something more exciting than prop-assisted wrestling. There is no way that a Star Trek with more space battles and less attempts to sit down and talk things through like grown-ups would be a bad thing.
Ignore The Laws Of Physics.
Okay, so Scotty kind of made a living doing that very thing on a regular basis despite his protests, but this isn't just managing to get that dilithium crystals back online a week earlier than expected that we're talking about here. As Robert Loren Fleming once pointed out, George Lucas ignored scientific fact that said that there was no sound in the vacuum of space and became a multi-millionaire. JJ Abrams has proven that he's willing to ignore reality in favor of fun storytelling in Fringe, so I'm looking forward to a Star Trek that takes full advantage of the possibilities of science fiction to give us the most dramatically satisfying story ever. And if that means that we see multiple time-traveling James T Kirks all existing in the same scene to punch a room full of Romulans, all the better.
Have At Least One Sequence That Will Make A Good Video Game.
You know what I'm talking about; there's one in every Star Wars movie, whether it be pod-racing, speeder-biking through the forests of Endor or cutting Anakin Skywalker's legs off while lava bubbles all around you. At its best, the Star Wars series doesn't just put you in the center of the action, it makes you want to literally be the one doing all the action. There's no better way to hit the nerd g-spot than appeal to our wish-fulfillment fantasies so blatantly, after all. And what does Star Trek have to compare? Nothing... yet. JJ, you know what you have to do.
Put Uhura In A Metal Bikini At Some Point.
And talking of nerd wish-fulfillment fantasies... As much as you may sigh and pretend that you're all appalled at such pandering, you know you want to see it. Especially if she's chained up next to one of those green Orion slave girls.
Send an email to Graeme McMillan, the author of this post, at graeme@io9.com.
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