Spock and the Legacy of Star Trek

StartsWithABang writes While the nerd/geek world mourns the death of Leonard Nimoy in its own way, it's important to remember the legacy that Star Trek — and that Spock and alien characters like him — left on our world. Unlike any other series, Star Trek used a futuristic, nearly utopian world to explore our own moral battles and failings, and yet somehow always managed to weave in an optimism about humanity and our future. This is something, the author argues, that is sorely missing from the new J.J. Abrams movies.

Comments

Live

[invictusvoyd]

long and prosper .. sniff

Re:Live

[Anonymous Coward]

I enjoyed the FIRST of the new Star Trek movies, it was a good popcorn flick and I was satisfied how they handled the trek universe for the most part, regardless of the lack of utopian optomism. The second movie though, not so good most of the way through, but when they re-did "that scene" - wow.
WOW Holy shit, they brought out an inner Trek Nerd I didn't even know existed in me. That was insulting as fuck. The most touching scene in the history of Star Trek, re-hashed as an homage? Fuck off.

Ultimately though the article summary is correct, there's this innocent wonder, optomism and good in the vast majority of Star Trek, particularly ToS and TNG which is just doesn't exist in most other movies or TV shows. It's sorely lacking in the world.
I've always been a cynical bastard who loves to hate on things, loves a dark theme but it's so over done now, SO over done. It's sad that it's refreshing to see people with clear, honest, straight up good values.

I'm not a big fan of the Marvel movies (they aren't terrible) but I really like Captain America. If you told me 15 years ago, I'd like Captain America, I wouldn't believe you. I'd say "that's lame" "he's a dork" "who cares". But now? In the society we're all living in? Captain America is refreshingly good and nice, it's great. (This is also why the original 1977 Superman is a masterpiece, it's an archive of a time long gone where good was good because it's right)

I fear that with the death of Gene Roddenberry and the worlds ever intense focus on money, which while always existing, has become sharpened the last decade or two, you're just not going to see a classic return to original, cheesy, fun Star Trek. It has to have an edge to appeal to the mainstream. Maybe some tits or a fistfight or someone lying or cheating or bullshit drama.
In TnG when someone cheated or did something bad, it was addressed, it was weird, they investigated, found why the person was sad / angry / hateful and they fixed it because it's not productive, it's not good to be like that. Nowadays as per /the norm/ someone is going to be a piece of shit with all these complexities in a TV show, cheating / lying / playing games / one upping people is normal behaviour on standard television :/

ToS and TnG might be utopian and cheesy but it's in a good way. I laugh with them and I laugh at them and when I laugh at them, I don't dislike it. I just go "oh Star Trek" and keep on watching. Unfortunately for most people, that shit won't play anymore. The people who respect that kind of television are few and far between now.

As for Nimoy, RIP indeed :( RIP - if I can give you all one piece of advice, go read his timeline of tweets for the last couple of years, he'll tell you one critical thing. STOP.SMOKING.NOW

RIP Spock and RIP good values in television and movies, arguably, RIP Star Trek

Re:Live

[hedleyroos]

I'm pretty sure his shirt was white and gold.

Spock is not dead.

[Z00L00K]

Only the vessel for him carried by Leonard Nimoy has passed on, but as long as he's remembered he's not truly dead.

The Original Series did a lot within the frame of that series to actually poke at contemporary issues about racism and other things. It was not so much about the science as it was about studies on humanitarian issues.

Re:Make it DARKER dammit.

[garyisabusyguy]

I think that you need to look at the generation of authors that created Star Trek TOS, they (like Roddenberry) were military veterans from WW2 and seemed to believe that good could overcome evil, bridges could be built across cultures and the idea of service to the betterment of their society wasn't an alien idea.

Harlan Ellison wrote one of the darkest original episodes, City on the Edge of Forever, and maybe the popular acclaim that it received allowed younger authors to take the series into different directions. When TNG was produced the authors were largely younger than the original group, with Roddenberry providing oversight through the the later series that were almost playing a neo-classical hand with references to past episodes and different riffs on themes.

Now Roddenberry is gone and the ownership of Star Trek has been taken over by generations of authors that never knew life before there was a Star Trek...

At least that is my long-winded summation of how we got to where we are now. What would it take to get it back in line with TOS? Maybe a dose of optimism and belief in conquering great evils and striving for a greater society. Maybe it just isn't a widely held set of beliefs anymore

It is that sort of spine that Spock brought to the new productions when he was brought into the story line. I think that is what we will miss most about both Nimoy and Spock

Re:Star Trek gave us a future to shoot for.

[Anonymous Coward]

Where are the Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindu, Sikhs, Jains, etc etc. The answer is: They don't exist.

Sorry, you're attributing your own wishful thinking to Star Trek here. Kirk, McCoy, and Uhura have spoken of Christ. Khan Singh is a Sikh. Worf's parents are Jewish. And the Vulcan salute is a traditional Jewish benediction, intended as such by Nimoy himself.