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William Shatner Wakes Up Crew for Final Discovery Mission

Posted by samzenpus on from the discovery-cancelled dept.

The Space Shuttle Discovery left the International Space Station this morning for the last time. To commemorate the ship's accomplishments over 27 years of service, the crew was greeted to a morning wake-up message from Capt. Kirk. "Space, the final frontier," Shatner said in a prerecorded message. "These have been the voyages of the space shuttle Discovery. Her 30-year mission: to seek out new science, to build new outposts, to bring nations together on the final frontier, to boldly go and do what no spacecraft has done before."

11 of 185 comments (clear)

  1. WoW by dakkon1024 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    This is nerdy, even by my standards.

    1. Re:WoW by Higaran · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Yes, but it's still awesome on soo many levels.

    2. Re:WoW by Sonny+Yatsen · · Score: 4, Insightful

      But, it's so appropriate. Ask a lot of the Astronauts and Engineers at NASA what inspired them as children to work for NASA and in space and you will get a pretty good percentage of people citing how they, as kids, sat around a tiny television set in the late 60s or early 70s watching Captain Kirk, Dr. McCoy and Mr. Spock explore the galaxy.

      I can't think of a better or more appropriate way to send off the Discovery as it goes home. (There is a little bit of me in the back of my head that wished that the Space Shuttle Enterprise made it to space - then Shatner's sendoff would be even more appropriate.)

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    3. Re:WoW by isorox · · Score: 3, Insightful

      So has anime, but if I'm on the ISS and the theme from Astro Boy comes out of the speakers, I'm unlikely to recognize its cultural significance.

      That's because is has no cultural significance beyond a few nerdy fanboys. Star Trek is a massive, multinational, franchise. The last film brought in $125 million internationally, and indeed it was shown on the space station when it came out. Kirk and Spock are internationally known by anyone with the slightest interest in space.

  2. Wow by Lefty2446 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    That would have been a pretty emotional moment I would think.

  3. Have you noticed... by tekrat · · Score: 4, Insightful

    That William Shatner has, for more than the last decade, made an entire career out of being a parody of himself?

    I think it started with those Priceline commercials where he was singing "I've got two tickets to paradise..", and since then, all he's done is essentially do an SNL skit where William Shatner plays William Shatner hamming it up.

    And only he could get away with it.

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    1. Re:Have you noticed... by preaction · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Adam West started doing it earlier. So it's a shouting match you want, eh? Well game on Quahog! AAAAAH! AAAAAH! AAAAH! AAAH AH! I'm beating you!

  4. What a pity it wasn't Enterprise by thewils · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Then he could have woken them up with "Kirk to Enterprise".

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  5. Re:Pretty Ironic.... by GigG · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It isn't the job of the US Government to put a roof over anyone's head.

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  6. Re:Pretty Ironic.... by spire3661 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    This is quite possibly one of the dumbest statements ever. "Hey Columbus, no more boats for you until every king's subject is a free man...."

    Exploring space is worth FAR more then wasting money on people who should either do for themsleves or die out. Exploring space > wasting money on a worthless human that cant even take care of itself. We have BILLIONS of humans and we recklessesly encourage EVERY human to make more.

    Consider space exploration the mother of all insurance policies. It is absolutely imperative that we learn how to live off this rock for the survival of the species. There is no debate on this. At SOME point we HAVE to get off this rock. Armageddon literally could be tomorrow or several billion years from now.

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  7. Re:Pretty Ironic.... by trollertron3000 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Tell that to the people in Egypt.

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