The Original Series | the m0vie blog

Star Trek: Mirror, Mirror #1 – Fragile Glass (Review)

Posted on October 12, 2013 by Darren

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is twenty years old this year. To celebrate, I’m taking a look at the first and second season. Check back daily for the latest review or retrospective.

We’ll be supplementing our coverage of the episodes with some additional materials – mainly novels and comics and films. This is one such entry.

One of the benefits and the curses of tie-in material is the ability to connect the dots – to tie together two parts of continuity separated by time and space, filling in the blanks in some character or plot arc. Often, this feels extraneous at best. In order for the televised stories to work, there must be enough information conveyed effectively to the audience so they can make their own leaps. Trying to plug imaginary and unnecessary holes is seldom satisfying.

On the other hand, there are occasionally gaps that are worth exploring. These are gaps that have been explained on the show, but which are still large enough that creators can fit their own interesting stories between them. The divide between Mirror, Mirror and Crossover is one such gap, as we go from the original Star Trek‘s version of the mirror universe to the very different iteration seen on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

Tom DeFalco’s Fragile Glass attempts to sketch in some of the details around this gap. While it’s not entirely satisfying as either a missing link or a story in its own right, it does offer some nice pulpy fun and gets considerable mileage out of the “Spock vs. Kirk” premise.

I am not Spock…

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Filed under: Comics, The Original Series | Tagged: Amok Time, Benedict Cumberbatch, deep space nine, games, kirk, Kirk/Spock, Klingon, mirror, science fiction, spock, star trek: deep space nine, star trek: enterprise, star trek: the next generation, star trek: the original series, StarTrek, Sulu, Tom DeFalco, Zachary Quinto | Leave a comment »

Star Trek (DC Comics, 1989) Annual #2 – Starfleet Academy!

Posted on August 30, 2013 by Darren

This August, to celebrate the upcoming release of Star Trek: Into Darkness on DVD and blu ray, we’re taking a look at the Star Trek movies featuring the original cast. Movie reviews are every Tuesday and Thursday.

We’ll be supplementing our coverage of the movies with tie-ins around (and related to) the films. We’ll be doing one of these every week day. This is one such article.

Multimedia franchises tend to have very strange lives. These iconic pop culture characters rarely seem to ride off into the sunset in any real way. Their story might end, but there’s always a new beginning just waiting for them. When veteran Star Trek writer Ronald D. Moore took charge of the reboot of Battlestar Galactica, he even wove the idea into the fabric of the show. “All of this has happened before and will happen again,” the characters repeated.

It’s been a Hollywood fad for the last decade, with high-budget reboots like Batman Begins and The Amazing Spider-Man suggesting that icons never die, they just get reinvented. However, it has always been a feature of the pop culture landscape. Think of how many adaptations of Batman have run their course, or how many times in how many different media Sherlock Holmes has played out his game of wits. Life for these iconic properties is something of a spinning wheel. It seems that no sooner are you off one side than you are back on the other.

So, with the release of Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country in 1991, it seemed the ideal time for Star Trek author Peter David to venture back to the very beginning, and to explore Kirk’s time at Starfleet Academy!

“By the way, I like David as a name…”

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Filed under: Comics, The Original Series | Tagged: Ben Finney, Carol Marcus, David, Faster-than-light, kirk, List of Star Trek characters (G–M), Marcus, peter david, spock, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Star Trek III: The Search For Spock, star trek vi: the undiscovered country, Starfleet Academy, StarTrek, Where No Man Has Gone Before, William Shatner | 1 Comment »

Star Trek: Mirror Universe – Shards & Shadows: The Greater Good by Margaret Wander Bonanno

Posted on August 30, 2013 by Darren

We’ll be supplementing our coverage of the movies with tie-ins around (and related to) the films. We’ll be doing one of these every week day. This is one such article.

If Star Trek and Star Trek: Into Darkness proved one thing, it’s that it sucks to be Christopher Pike, in any universe. The first captain of the USS Enterprise not only had to wait until 1988 to see his pilot (The Cage) finally broadcast on television, he also got shuffled off-screen unceremoniously in the franchise’s first two-parter (The Menagerie) and was never really mentioned again. When JJ Abrams’ Star Trek introduced us to a rebooted Christopher Pike played wonderfully by Bruce Greenwood, he observed of George Kirk was captain of a starship for eight minutes. It seemed like Pike ended up in command of the Enterprise for only slightly longer than that.

It seems that even mirror!Pike can’t catch a break, as Margaret Wander Bonanno demonstrates in her short little glimpse into how exactly mirror!James Tiberius Kirk took control of the ISS Enterprise.

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Filed under: The Original Series | Tagged: Bonanno, Cage, Christopher Pike, james t. kirk, kirk, Margaret Wander Bonanno, mirror, Pike, spock, Star Trek Into Darkness, StarTrek | Leave a comment »

Star Trek (DC Comics, 1984) Annual #1 – All Those Years Ago…

Posted on August 28, 2013 by Darren

We’ll be supplementing our coverage of the movies with tie-ins around (and related to) the films. We’ll be doing one of these every week day. This is one such article.

It’s weird to think that the original cast of Star Trek didn’t get a proper on-screen origin story until JJ Abrams rebooted the franchise in 2009. The show produced two pilots – The Cage and Where No Man Has Gone Before – and even the pilot episode that wound up airing was broadcast as the third episode of the first season. Given the realities of sixties television, it’s probably not too surprising. Rather famously, Gilligan’s Island scrapped its origin story pilot, reworking some of the footage (along with re-shot footage) into a later episode – deciding to skip the story of how everybody got here and just get to the meat of the story.

And you can understand why this approach worked with the original Star Trek. Structurally, the series was a product of its time, largely episodic. Sure, there were recurring alien races and even a few recurring guest stars outside the senior staff, but there was a sense you could jumble the viewing order of most of the episodes up and not notice anything strange.

At the same time, the lack of an origin leaves a vacuum. After all, each of the four following spin-offs opened with a two-hour special about putting the crew together to take their place on the final frontier. In hindsight, having had years to grow old with these characters and watch their friendships (and personalities) deepen and broaden, it occurs to us that we never really say them come together for the first time.

All Those Years Ago... isn’t nearly as elaborate or as sophisticated as Vonda M. McIntyre’s Enterprise: The First Adventure, but it does hint at a growing curiosity about how the team came to work together.

Second star on the right…

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Filed under: Comics, The Original Series | Tagged: Amok Time, dc comics, kirk, Marv Wolfman, Mike W. Barr, Motion Picture - Star Trek, spock, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Star Trek III: The Search For Spock, star trek iv the voyage home, Star Trek Original Series, Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, StarTrek, Where No Man Has Gone Before | 6 Comments »

Star Trek – Cast No Shadow by James Swallow (Review)

Posted on August 27, 2013 by Darren

We’ll be supplementing our coverage of the movies with tie-ins around (and related to) the films. We’ll be doing one of these every week day. This is one such article.

Valeris is a fascinating character who gets a bit lost in the scope of Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. Given the film’s focus on bidding a fond farewell to the iconic crew of the Enterprise, it’s understandable that the newest addition to the crew should get pushed aside. It’s even more notable because Valeris is clearly a stand-in for the character of Saavik, another of Spock’s young female Vulcan protegés, making her not only a newer character, but a substitute for a newer character.

One of the most interesting things about Star Trek tie-in fiction is the scope afforded by the gigantic shared universe. Across the dozen movies and the seven-hundred episodes of television, there are countless supporting characters and concepts thrown out. Due to plotting necessities and the demands of particular stories, some of these ideas are never truly fleshed out. The sheer volume of tie-in material means that writers do get a chance to develop and expand upon these character which might otherwise be forgotten.

Writing a novel centred on Valeris is a very bold idea, but one which acknowledges just how intriguing the concept of Kim Cattrall’s Vulcan traitor is, despite the fact the film treats her as a minor character at best.

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Filed under: The Original Series | Tagged: James Swallow, John M. Ford, kirk, Kirstie Alley, Klingon, Leonard Nimoy, List of Star Trek characters (G–M), ronald d. moore, Saavik, spock, star trek, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, star trek iv the voyage home, Star Trek Movie Memories, star trek vi: the undiscovered country, Star Trek: The Motion Picture, StarTrek | 2 Comments »

Star Trek – Shadows on the Sun by Michael Jan Friedman (Review)

Posted on August 26, 2013 by Darren

We’ll be supplementing our coverage of the movies with tie-ins around (and related to) the films. We’ll be doing one of these every week day. This is one such article.

It almost feels like sacrilege to fill in the gap left at the end of Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. The film was such a perfect send-off that picking up a novel directly after the end credits role feels like it might undermine the perfect farewell story for the veteran crew. After all, director Nicholas Meyer suggested that the film was an attempt to capture the spirit of Fukuyama’s “end of history”, representing the “end of history” for the original crew.

Except, of course, it wasn’t the end. In terms of internal Star Trek chronology, episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation had picked up on the later adventures of Scotty and Spock. Star Trek: Voyager would flashback to a Sulu story unfolding concurrently with The Undiscovered Country. Scotty and Chekov would appear in Star Trek: Generations, which would also serve as a disappointing farewell to one James Tiberius Kirk. It seems bitterly appropriate (if far from fair) that Uhura should remain the only major player whose story actually ends with The
Undiscovered Country.

Still, despite his passing of the torch appearance in Encounter at Farpoint, you could make an argument that The Undiscovered Country was the end of the line for Leonard McCoy more than Kirk or Spock. And, as such, Michael Jan Friedman’s Shadows on the Sun serves as an effective (if flawed) reflection on the way that McCoy’s presence sort of faded from the 24th century spin-offs.

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Filed under: The Original Series | Tagged: August, Darkness, film, kirk, Leonard McCoy, McCoy, spock, Star Trek Into Darkness, Star Trek Next Generation, Star Trek Original Series, Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, star trek vi: the undiscovered country, StarTrek, Thursday, Tuesday, Undiscovered Country | Leave a comment »

Star Trek: Excelsior – Forged in Fire by Michael A. Martin and Andy Mangels (Review)

Posted on August 23, 2013 by Darren

We’ll be supplementing our coverage of the movies with tie-ins around (and related to) the films. We’ll be doing one of these every week day. This is one such article.

I have to admit, when I first saw Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, I was a bit surprised to be introduced to Captain Hikaru Sulu. This was a character who didn’t even have a first name before The Undiscovered Country. The name chosen – “Hikaru” – was taken from Vonda N. McIntyre’s 1981 tie-in The Entropy Effect. Still, I suppose it could be worse. Uhura didn’t get a first name on screen until the release of Star Trek in 2009.

So it seemed strange that this supporting character should find himself the commanding officer of a starship, let alone a state-of-art ship of the line which opened the fond farewell to the original series crew. Still, the character of Captain Hikaru Sulu remains one of the most interesting branches sprouting off the trunk of Star Trek. Takei would reprise the role on Star Trek: Voyager, hold down a couple of Simon & Schuster audio adventures and even feature heavily in tie-in novels and comic books. Takei is quite fond of recounting his campaign to launch a television show centred around the character.

It’s quite remarkable, as Sulu is probably the only major character who could credibly “spin-off” from the original Star Trek show, which is remarkable for a supporting performer whose most iconic moment in the classic Star Trek show was waving a sword through the corridors while practically naked.

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Filed under: The Original Series | Tagged: Denny Martin Flinn, Hikaru Sulu, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Star Trek Original Series, star trek vi: the undiscovered country, Starship Enterprise, StarTrek, Undiscovered Country, Vonda N. McIntyre | Leave a comment »

Star Trek – The Movies (Review)

Posted on August 22, 2013 by Darren

It’s interesting how radically different the Star Trek feature films were from the show that spawned them. All were anchored in the classic science-fiction series. Star Trek: The Motion Picture felt like it was heavily influenced by The Changeling. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan obviously drew on Space Seed. Star Trek III: The Search for Spock evoked The Menagerie. Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home featured the same plot device (and time travel technique) as Tomorrow is Yesterday. Star Trek V: The Final Frontier had Kirk defeating one final god-like being. Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country had the crew finally make peace with Klingons.

However, they were quite clearly a very different animal from the original television show. Which makes a great deal of sense. After all, there’s a world of difference between a fifty-minute adventure produced for weekly television and a big theatrical event. However, what’s interesting about these changes is that they weren’t necessarily in the direction you might expect. The television show was a collection of episodic adventures, but what’s really striking about the films is that most of them have a reasonably clear serialised arc.

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Filed under: The Original Series | Tagged: Changeling, Gene L. Coon, gene roddenberry, Motion Picture - Star Trek, Roddenberry, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Star Trek III: The Search For Spock, star trek iv the voyage home, Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, star trek vi: the undiscovered country, StarTrek | Leave a comment »

Star Trek Special #2 (DC Comics, 1994) – A Question of Loyalty (Review)

Posted on August 22, 2013 by Darren

We’ll be supplementing our coverage of the movies with tie-ins around (and related to) the films. We’ll be doing one of these every week day. This is one such article.

A Question of Loyalty is essentially a Star Trek character study, comparing and contrasting the two young Vulcan female characters to appear in the film franchise, providing a meeting between Valeris and Saavik, Spock’s two young protegés. The production history of Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country is interesting, as there were early plans to include Saavik. For a variety of reasons, this didn’t work out and director Nicholas Meyer and his writers decided to cast a new role, Valeris. A Question of Loyalty allows the two characters to come face-to-face, and offers both some character motivation for the under-developed Valeris and a fond farewell for Saavik.

Her ears are tingling…

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Filed under: Comics, The Original Series | Tagged: Andorian, james t. kirk, kirk, Klingon, List of Star Trek characters (T–Z), Multiracial, Rick Santorum, Saavik, spock, star trek, Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, Undiscovered Country, vulcan, Zachary Quinto | Leave a comment »

Star Trek – In the Name of Honour by Dayton Ward (Review)

Posted on August 21, 2013 by Darren

We’ll be supplementing our coverage of the movies with tie-ins around (and related to) the films. We’ll be doing one of these every week day. This is one such article.

The Klingons changed rather dramatically, between the classic Star Trek and Star Trek: The Next Generation. Part of the changes were physical – most obviously, advances in make-up allowed Klingon characters to be shown with their now-iconic forehead ridges. However, there was another interesting change. Somewhere between The Turnabout Intruder and Encounter at Farpoint, the Klingons went from generic communist stand-ins to a fully-formed alien culture with a wealth of ritual and tradition.

To a large extent, this shift took place during the movie era. Klingons wound up being the focus of Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, and were a significant presence in each of the films that followed. Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, produced at the same time as the first season of Star Trek: The Next Generation, suggested that it wasn’t necessary for the Federation and the Klingon Empires to be mortal enemies. The final movie featuring the original cast, Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, tied up Kirk’s adventures with the promise of galactic peace.

Still, it’s hard to reconcile the differences in characterisation between the Klingons seen in the classic Star Trek television show and those from the later spin-offs. With In the Name of Honour, Dayton Ward tries to explore this radical shift and also to bridge The Final Frontier and The Undiscovered Country. He does the former much better than the latter.