Why did they bother...

Discussion in 'Star Trek Movies: Kelvin Universe' started by Captain Nebula, May 26, 2013.

  1. F. King Daniel

    F. King Daniel Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    I think "cultural icons" is pushing it a degree or 50,000.
    And this Star Trek is Star Trek. It's as authentic Trek as The Dark Knight Rises is Batman or Skyfall is Bond or Game of Shadows is Sherlock Holmes.
    Yes, and we saw that with TNG, DS9, VOY and ENT, with diminishing returns each and every time.
     
  2. Commishsleer

    Commishsleer Commodore Commodore

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    Because I'm old I'm going to bore you with a story.

    About 20 years ago (or more) I bought a friend of mine a TOS cast t-shirt because he loved TNG. Loving my gift :rolleyes: he took it away on a holiday to climb the Himalayas where he would be camping and staying in huts without running water and electricity.
    He came back and he told me that he was amazed how many people recognised the people on the shirt. In places without TV or movie theatres where they didn't speak English, people would come up to him and say 'Kirk', 'Spock'.
    So you claim they're not icons but a lot of people around the world recognise them.
     
  3. F. King Daniel

    F. King Daniel Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    But would they only recognize Nimoy, or would anyone in the distinctive pointed ears, bowl cut and uniform garner the same recognition? Just like a guy with a blue suit, red cape and \S/ on their chest is Superman?
     
  4. Halmirdax

    Halmirdax Lieutenant Commander Red Shirt

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    We know and love the characters, not just the actors. The actors have been immense in taking up these roles and making them memorable yet again. It is very refreshing.
    I'm grateful for the old and the new but a new Star Trek film wouldn't have been the same without those particular characters. - Pretty much reiterating what lots of other people have said but adding that I agree.
     
  5. Commishsleer

    Commishsleer Commodore Commodore

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    Its the Spock that was created after 79 episodes of TOS and maybe TAS and maybe some movies. At that stage it was Nimoy Spock.
     
  6. OpenMaw

    OpenMaw Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Well, origin story, ya know. Seeing the origin of one of science fiction's best friendships. It's one of the elements of Harve Bennett's story I rather liked. In that, in very simple terms, it basically goes Kirk helps Spock, Spock helps Kirk, then they help each other in the end. They're not really ever at odds, but they're depicted as unlikely friends because of their different backgrounds.

    Though i'd still consider it "wrong" honestly. Simply because I always felt the start of Kirk and Spock's friendship was best established as a course both characters would follow in WNMHGB, and done rather well there too.
     
  7. TREK_GOD_1

    TREK_GOD_1 Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Actually, it is a common story. In my travels, the image of Shatner as Kirk / Nimoy as Spock were and remain instantly familiar--unlike the majority of random actors who are in and out of a role (even if successful), with limited effects & for some reason, the personalities and/or vibe of the performers were not so locked into the characters as in the TOS case.

    The only other rare cases I can think of where the actor so defines a role that all others to follow never matched the effect/association: Karloff as Frankenstein or Garland as The Wizard of Oz's Dorothy or Lugosi as Dracula. Rare and historic company, as all have had others take on the characters on film and TV (some famous, such as Lee's Dracula), but blink, and you missed most who followed.

    That is the measure of the iconoc character tied to and eqully iconic performer: anyone else in the role would not be at the right place/right time of their lives to influence/define a character in a way which touched people (from various walks of life) so much, that it had been impossible to replace or match the performer/character association.
     
  8. Admiral Buzzkill

    Admiral Buzzkill Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Mickey Mouse is more widely known in the world than anything associated with Star Trek, and he doesn't look or sound much like "Steamboat Willie." For that matter, the same is true of Superman - also better known than Kirk or Spock.

    If one must use the silly "icon" word, outside a certain local cultural set it's probably the iconography associated with the characters that's recognized, rather than the faces of the actors - Spock's ears, Superman's costume and "S" shield, the Enterprise (which is essentially identical in Abrams's films to every other version).
     
  9. Alex1939

    Alex1939 Captain Captain

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    $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

    That is the answer.


    Although I've accepted what JJ Abrams trek is which is a rip-off or homage depending on your point of view to one of the most iconic tv/movie franchises of all time. That's why you have to have Khan in a story even though the villain could've not been Khan and this story would've been fine.

    But in all honesty, I've enjoyed what JJ has done even if I am just a sucker for the fanboy winks like section 31 and Praxis.

    I would like to see him try to do something truly original with this cast. Not recycle old trek villains and the "Earth will be exploded!" or "Big bad ship that is bigger and badder than Enterprise" cliches. JJ is definitely a good director and makes very pretty visual movies. Dialogue/story could use improvement.

    But I'm really just bitching, because overall I enjoyed both movies.

    And hey, I'm interested to see JJ's take on the Borg. I hope they are menacing like Best of Both Worlds and not like ST:Voyager.



    It would be interesting to see a total re-boot with similar concepts (warp/transporters) and races (klingons/vulcans) but totally different characters/motivations/world building.
     
  10. Greg Cox

    Greg Cox Admiral Premium Member

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    Well, this is often a generational thing. As I've mentioned before, I was appalled to discover, decades ago, that my youngest brother thought that Roger Moore was the "real" James Bond. I was horrified at first (everybody knew that Connery was the one true Bond), but then I realized it made perfect sense from his perspective. My brother, who was seventeen years younger than me, had grown up on Moore just like I had grown up on Connery.

    Trust me on this, ten years from now there will be an entire generation for whom Pine and Quinto are the "real" Kirk and Spock. That's just the way it works.

    Heck, not long ago, people were horrified at idea of Universal remaking the "classic" Brendan Fraser version of THE MUMMY, which was, of course, at least the third remake of the 1932 Karloff version.
     
  11. TREK_GOD_1

    TREK_GOD_1 Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Poor examples. As cartoon and comic book characters, respectively, Mickey and Superman were subjected to numerous changes in their early years--there was no hardline, established look in the way the right actor immediately shapes a role with traits that are not always born of the screenwriter's pen. The Superman of Action Comics #1 was already altered by the time AC#6 or 7, where the "S" chest emblem took on a new look, alternated outline colors, along with the color of his cape emblem.

    The same can be said of the early, radical changes in other comic & cartoon characters such as Batman or Bugs Bunny, where again, no early, hardline look/character was established--with effect--in the way of a live actor not only in voice, but appearance, as in Garland, Shatner and Nimoy.

    To cite Karloff again, nevermind other, non-Universal productions hardly remembered, all one has to do is look at the younger Chaney's take in Ghost of Frankenstein, or Lugosi's in Frankenstein Meets The Wolf Man; gone was the established, Karloff heart of unique performance beneath the make-up which (in no minir way) turned the "monster" into a powerful cultural image starting in the film's decade of origin.

    The only result of recasting was how often the public complained about the terrible, lumbering performances, still criticized (or disregarded) today.

    Spock's ears or the Enterprise do not replace the recognition of Shatner as Kirk, or the whole of Nimoy as the character, whether together or in solo images.

    It is the actor's lightning-in-a-bottle shaping of a character which makes a cultural icon. They are not pick n'n swap parts like that found in so many reimagining/reboots to follow. The very reason the nuTrek actors--with all the money and marketing in the world--are not in the same position, two movies in.
     
  12. Belz...

    Belz... Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    I think Khan is responsible. He's the one who fired on their ships and caused it to shut down, forcing Kirk to sacrifice his life. The Enterprise was already damaged, but it was still operating.
     
  13. sj4iy

    sj4iy Commander Red Shirt

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    Elmer Fudd started out as an offensive stereotype of a black man, but very few people even know about that today. Even though that was his "original" form, I don't see anyone arguing that he should be changed back to what he was, because it would not work in today's society (it didn't even work for very long after that cartoon was aired, and has been banned for a long time). Same with Kirk and Spock...their original characters don't fit into today's entertainment, and evolving them was the best thing to do. Example of the original Elmer Fudd.
     
  14. beamMe

    beamMe Commodore

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    I wanted to point that out to him. :(
     
  15. RoJoHen

    RoJoHen Awesome Admiral

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    Besides, "ADMIRAL MARCUUUUUUUUSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!" doesn't have the same ring to it. :p
     
  16. marksound

    marksound Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Side note: I don't think that's supposed to be Elmer Fudd. The cartoon All This and Rabbit Stew featuring that character was released in September 1941, after Elmer Fudd made his official debut in 1940 in Elmer's Candid Camera.

    A Fudd-like character called Egghead had been introduced by Tex Avery as early as 1937, voiced by Danny Webb and later Arthur Q. Bryan. Many historians believe it was this character that evolved into Elmer Fudd, as both Egghead and Fudd were voiced by Bryan.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Daffy_Duck_and_Egghead.JPG

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:ElmersCamera.jpg
     
  17. CorporalClegg

    CorporalClegg Admiral Admiral

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    This is an icon:
    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]

    Those are four distinctly different faces presumably from four different actors/models. Yet show any one those pictures to anyone, anywhere and he or she is going to immediately know who it is.

    The second is probably the most ubiquitously familiar; that does not make him the most iconic.

    Aside from being an anecdote and thus proof of nothing, this gives no indication of how many people walked by who had no idea who they were.

    Non the less, note they said "Kirk" and "Spock" not "Shatner!" "Nimoy!"

    Dollars to donuts, your friend could paste Pine and Quinto's faces onto said shirt and get a similar reaction.

    Also, I wonder if, had you given your friend with a picture of Shatner and Nimoy drinking cocktails while wearing 70s leisure suits, he would have garnered the same level of attention?


    Here's a challenge:

    Take stills from the Fleischer cartoon and MoS and walk around public asking "Which one's Superman?"

    Good grief...

    Can you even define "icon?"
     
  18. Belz...

    Belz... Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    A person or thing of international renown or recognition ?
     
  19. Greg Cox

    Greg Cox Admiral Premium Member

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    I do think the word "icon" tends to get thrown around pretty loosely these days. Back when I used to lurk on comic book boards, it was not uncommon to see Martian Manhunter or Blue Beetle described as "iconic" by hardcore comics fans . . . which is probably pushing things a little.

    If I had my way, the words "canon" and "iconic" would be expunged from the internet. :)
     
  20. CorporalClegg

    CorporalClegg Admiral Admiral

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    I wholeheartedly agree.