After completing my first run of films I-VI I have this to say...

Give 'em credit though, the underwater scenes at the end of The Voyage Home, that rug looks marvelous

 

It looked real to me

 

Although TMP was financially justified by the success of Star Wars, it's much more influenced by 2001: A Space Odyssey. The slow pace, serious tone, and journey toward cosmic revelation. I think it came from Roddenberry's desire to distance himself from the pop, slightly camp feeling that accompanied the 6os show (at least in retrospect). Unfortunately it went too far, and lost the "fun factor" - the spoonful of sugar that helps the utopian-sf medicine go down.

 

I really think Gene was more interested in the philosophy and moral dilemmas behind Star Trek than he was fascinated with the characters and their arcs. That shows in how he handled The Cage, TMP, and early TNG. I wouldn't say he didn't care at all for characters. He seemed to care a lot for those that straddled the emotion/logic divide like Spock and Data. But overall, he seemed to want to "use" characters as a means to an end rather than being the main attraction. His kinds of stories were meant to make you think about an issue and not necessarily be charmed by or empathize with the leads. Maybe a little titillation was as much as he'd let his hair down with characters.

From II onward, there was more of an attempt to sell the characters back to the audience as these cherished icons who would go through their usual round of crowd-pleasing mannerisms.

Witness the news today about whether or not to put Shatner and Nimoy into the new film. Few people are wondering whether the film will have anything interesting to say about the nature of the human condition. It's whether we'll have fan-service of one sort or another. So there's something to be said for making a film issue-driven rather than pushing sentimentality.

 

You're good.

 

Perfectly sums up why I don't want them to appear in the next movie

 

That's probably because they've seen the last two movies.

If I were an image-meme person, this would the perfect time to post that one of the little girl saying "Why not both?" Shatner and Nimoy appearing in the next movie wouldn't preclude it from having something interesting to say about the nature of the human condition; the only thing that's preventing that from happening is the writers (and, in fairness, probably the studio as well) deciding that nonstop 'splosions are far more important than anything remotely deep happening.

 

You'll never see something if you're deliberately ignoring it. Spock's coming out allegory in ST'09 and ID's blatant condemnation of the US' use of drones are Star Trek through and through.

 

*ding* *ding* *ding* *ding* WE HAVE A WINNER!