Astronauts report it feels good

[prog]

There is a Star Trek movie teaser trailer coming out. I'm too lazy to link to it because it's basically nothing, just enough to confirm that the film's in production, and to signal the fanboys to commence the freakout. (Its audio is samples of Apollo mission radio chatter that you can hear in any dime-store trance mix, for pete's sake. OK, and Nimoy. All right, fine: http://www.paramount.com/startrek. Sheesh.)

If JJ Abrams can tell an entire SF story that has a satisfying ending in the length of a single feature film, all shall be forgiven. Until then, I'm skeptical.

Meanwhile I find myself really out of touch regarding movies. I saw a friend complaining in an IM status message that someone named Cloverfield made her feel sick, figuring it was a co-worker who should have stayed home.

Comments

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

There are some interesting casting choices: Zachary "Sylar" Quinto as young Spock, and Simon Pegg as Scotty.

But even if the movie is good, to me it's a sign of creative exhaustion of the Star Trek franchise. They stopped being able to credibly pretend that this material is about our future long ago; all they've got now is nostalgia. Enterprise only really hit its stride when it became an affectionate prequel to the original series (which was after most people stopped watching it, if they'd ever started), and the appeal of that is limited to people who are already Star Trek fanboys. This movie is apparently following the same thread.

[karlvonl.livejournal.com]

I never saw Batman Begins, because I felt that we've had enough Batman already, I'm sick of Batman, and I don't care if Batman Begins is the greatest Batman movie ever, the world doesn't need any more Batman. I'll probably skip the new Star Trek movie(s) for the same reason.

...Actually, that's not true. I just remembered that the real reason that I won't see the new Star Trek movie is that I already swore off all Star Trek a long time ago, right after season 1 of Voyager.

[radtea.livejournal.com]

I dearly hope it bombs.

Every retread on an existing universe makes it that much harder for a new universe to get off the ground.

There have been 10+ Star Trek movies produced in the past 29 years, and maybe three arguably first-rate new-universe SF films (Blade Runner, The Fifth Element and Serenity). Coincidence? I don't think so...