A director with flare

A couple of nights ago, the final piece of the puzzle for new Star Wars movies, apart from the casting of actors (or, hopefully, the re-casting of actors), was announced. J.J. Abrams, Hollywood golden boy de jour, was confirmed as the new director for Episode VII by Lucasfilm.

Abrams is a favorite of many of my co-workers, particularly for his involvement on Lost. The only of his movies I'm familiar with is, of course, Star Trek. While I'm grateful that he and his team were able to kickstart that beloved franchise, I initially didn't think Abrams was the man for Star Wars. He seemed too trendy, and with a vision that was too specific and personal to take on someone else's world. If anything, the fact that he did Star Trek took him out of the running for Star Wars, in my opinion, since he put so much of himself in that film. I really don't want lens flare to start injecting itself into the Star Wars world ever 15 seconds.

There's also the fact that no one man should have that much absolute power over geekdom without some sort of general election, or something. Either, way, I thought it wasn't a good thing.

Happily, after a couple days to reflect, I'm pretty sure I was wrong.

In one of the articles I read on this, the writer referenced a TED Talk where Abrams talks about his love of mystery — both in life, and in storytelling.

There are a couple of cool things that came out of this talk. For one thing, he sounds like an Apple Geek's Apple Geek, which makes me like him immediately. The main thing, though, is when he references the first Star Wars movie as his primary example of the importance of withholding information in storytelling. I won't pretend to do it justice here, so just go and watch it.

Before I started watching this talk, I was pretty indifferent to Abrams getting his hands on Star Wars. After I saw it, I was one board 100 percent. Because, like Michael Arndt, he seems to get what makes Star Wars special at a basic level. It's not the characters, or the worlds they inhabit, or the technologies they use — its the story, and how that story is told.

I love the Prequels; to me, they are just as much a part of that world as the Original Trilogy. But what was missing, particularly in the first two films, was a sense of suspense. I'm pretty sure that, between Arndt and Abrams, that won't be a problem for Episode VII. And that is a very good thing indeed.

Saga Creed I: On the E.U.

This will be a short declaration fairly long screed on my Official Position on the Star Wars Expanded Universe. Ahem, and here goes:

I pretty much hate it.

Okay, obviously I won't be able to leave it at that. For those of you who don't know, the Expanded Universe, or E.U., are any stories or characters outside of the realm of the six Star Wars films. These six are called canon, which is a riff on the concept of canon scripture — i.e., something considered to be authoritative.

And I both love them and hate them. Mostly hate.

Mind you, I've been reading Star Wars novels for as long as there have been Star Wars novels, starting with the much-maligned and personally beloved Splinter of the Mind's Eye. It seems incredible in the age of instant information and communication in which we live, but in the days and months after Star Wars was first released in the late 70s, there was a big blob of nothing out there waiting if you wanted to get more of the Star Wars universe — especially if you lived in rural Tennessee, as I did.

You could:

Read Starlog — This godsend of a magazine debuted right around the time of Star Wars' release, as I recall, and contained articles about all things geek. My favorite memory was Starlog nailing the Blue Harvest ruse by Lucasfilm. It was the closest thing we had to regular news about the things we loved, and it was a lifeline back in the day.


Build models — Back before video games and DVDs, plastic model kits were both a way to get into the minutia of the Star Wars/Star Trek universe, and to fly your freak flag to any unsuspecting friends who happened to come over. My wife still talks about the shrine to Capt. Kirk I had built over my bed in college, including a picture of the man himself in the TOS-era captain's chair, framed by a collection of bugles and swords, and set off by a model of the TMP version of the Enterprise that I still regard as the high water mark of my model-making skills.

Talk to friends — This is still the heart of fandom, to me; listening and talking with someone who loves the things you love as much as you do, or maybe even more. Pretty much every friend I made in high school and college — notably my future wife and my two closest male friends — shared one or more of my great passions. Still, this had its drawbacks. For starters, the ratio of geeks to normal people in the 70s was still pretty low, and communications being what it was back then, it was pretty tough to find them. And I still remember my failed attempt to start my own Star Trek fan club while living in Ohio; it folded unceremoniously after the first meeting after the loud guffaws, giggles and constant interruptions from a boy who's name I can't recall cause me to give up 10 minutes in.

Write your own adventures — I have never been terribly productive at writing fiction. My first attempt was in my tweens, and I made another attempt a few years later. Both tries were seriously hampered by the fact that the word processor hadn't been invented yet, and I seem to be dependent on the much more malleable nature of digitized writing. But writing has always been a very popular way to dwell in the world of your choice; it is only since the birth of the internet that it has taken on the name Fan Fiction.

Read books —At last we come to it; the reason for the E.U.s of Star Trek, Star Wars and a few dozen other fandoms. The two big franchises are essentially story-telling mediums, albeit ones using very different narrative techniques. So if you really want to live in the galaxy far, far away (or the final frontier), and you don't have more canon to look forward to, what better way that through novels, comics and role-playing games that expand on that universe?

I wish that that were so. At its best, the E.U. novels do just that; they allow us to live in that world a little longer, visit with our favorite characters more, and have more adventures with them, and learn about how the world works. It gives you that little bit of extra time in a place where the Force works, space travel is how you get to work, and life is a little more black and white. They are, in a word, fun.

At their worst, they take beloved characters and turn them into something unrecognizable in the name of dramatic license; they carve off whole sections of a character's backstory to make what they're doing seem more important, and they create new characters that usually make the core characters look life buffoons. As I have observed elsewhere, Timothy Zahn did most of these in his widely-beloved Thrawn trilogy, which is widely credited/blamed with starting the whole E.U. business in the first place.

I should mention at this point that all of my knowledge comes from reading the E.U. in the mid-to-late 1990s, prior to the release of Phantom. From what I can infer on this rather good take on what the E.U. has become on fangirlblog.com, what I was reading then was actually the golden age of the Expanded Universe. Since then, there have been several multi-book sagas, one of which committed the cardinal sin of killing off Chewbacca, and none of which sound like very much fun.

I've mentioned fun twice, because at the end of the day, that is what Star Wars and Star Trek ultimately need to be for me; fun. Fun is my yardstick when it comes to Star Wars; I need to feel a sense of enjoyment. I don't go to those universes to get caught up in an angst-ridden soap opera with lightsabers. Drama is fine, but Star Wars is, first and foremost, an adventure story. It is, to use a crude analogy, Jules Verne, not Shakespeare.

That aside, I will tolerate not fun as long as George Lucas is the one dishing it out (witness Revenge of the Sith — grand and sweeping? Certainly. Riveting? Of course. Among the best of the saga? Possibly, depending on your point of view. Fun? Not so much). George is The Authority in his universe. But lately, because the content of the E.U. is so much larger than the core films themselves, it has, in the minds of many, become the main event; this multi-headed hydra, composed by a hundred different authors, all with different takes on the Star Wars characters and story, is, because of its sheer bulk, what is important, while the films themselves are, occasionally, made to conform to the product of the week to legitimize it. The tail is attempting to wag the dog.

A recent, and to me, rather infuriating example: One of my favorite vessels in A New Hope has always been the Tantive IV, also known as the Rebel Blockade Runner. Adopted from an early Ralph McQuarrie design concept for the Millennium Falcon, it is the first starship we see in the saga, as well as the site of the first battle. She never appeared again, and if anyone ever went anywhere near her history, I never saw it. I always wanted to know more about her, and when the ship made a glistening new appearance in Sith, I was thrilled to see the old girl again. It was, for me, an important link between Episode III and Episode IV.

I have only recently learned that in order to bring the ship into line with established E.U. continuity  — a vulgar practice apparently known as retconning — that ship has been stripped of its status as the Tantive IV, and is, instead, a similar ship from the Star Wars: Empire at War video game called the Sundered Heart. Apparently, this is the ship that Captain Antilles commanded when he wasn't aboard the Tantive IV. So when Obi-Wan lands on Bail Organa's ship, it's actually something from a video game I've never even heard of (and published a year after RotS) that's clawed its way into the films. It is not, as I've long believed, a beautiful bit of continuity and revealed backstory of one of the most iconic ships of the Star Wars story; it is some game designer's creation being forced into the main story. This was actually confirmed last year by Leland Chee, who has the unenviable task of making all of the myriad story lines in the Star Wars universe from the past 34 years seem like a continuous epic.

One point made often by the crew of The ForceCast is that the Star Wars story is ultimately what George says it is. It belongs to him, both as an artist, and in a very real, and legally binding sense. He is the master storyteller; he created the characters; he is, to use a fan nickname for him, The Maker. If he told us all tomorrow that Han Solo was actually Palpatine's half-brother, I wouldn't like it (as I didn't like the revelation that Luke and Leia were brother and sister back in the day), but I would have to live with it. And while I have nothing against Leland, his five-years-after-the-fact declaration isn't enough to change my mind. The fact is, there were toys from the time of the movie labeling the ship as the Tantive IV, which pretty much ends the debate for me.

I've gone far afield here, and probably muddied up the place with my griping about the E.U., when all I wanted this post to do was state my official position — my creed as a Star Wars fan when it comes to canon. And that, simply said, is this.

1. I believe that the six Star Wars films are the only truly canonical sources.
2. I believe that the Star Wars novels written from Splinter of the Mind's Eye onward should be regarded as professionally created fan fiction; fun, and occasionally edifying and instructive, but not authoritative.
3. I believe even more strongly that all of the Star Wars video games and comics should be taken with several grains, or perhaps an entire shaker, of salt.
4. I believe if you personally wish to adopt any or all of the novels, games, comics, cartoons, holiday specials or other fare, into your understanding of the Star Wars universe, you are free to do so. You are not free to tell me what pieces of the novels, games, comics, cartoons, holiday specials or other fare that I am allowed to adopt for my understanding of the Star Wars universe, and vice-versa, even if you work for a company George owns.

George Lucas said that for him, the end of the Star Wars story came with the final scene of Return of the Jedi. I quote from the Official Site:

"But there's no story past Episode VI, there's just no story. It's a certain story about Anakin Skywalker and once Anakin Skywalker dies, that's kind of the end of the story. There is no story about Luke Skywalker, I mean apart from the books. But there's three worlds: There's my world that I made up, there's the licensing world that's the books, the comics, all that kind of stuff, the games, which is their world, and then there's the fans' world, which is also very rich in imagination, but they don't always mesh. All I'm in charge of is my world. I can't be in charge of those other people's world, because I can't keep up with it."

I find this comment to be liberating. I don't have to like the E.U. (or the licensing world, as George calls it). I can accept it on an item-by-item basis, or not accept it at all — it is a different creature entirely. If I want to read a Star Wars novel, or play a game, I can enjoy it, but I don't have to find some way to rationalize something as being canonical if I personally don't want to. Star Wars, for George, and for me, is the films.

Exactly which version of the films is a can of worms I will crack open at another time.

Postscript: I want to give ample credit to an excellent discussion on E.U. and canon between Fangirl  and the TheForce.net crew in the May 27 edition of The Weekly ForceCast, for inspiring and informing this post.

Another seal of approval

Friday night I took Yvonne out for her Mother's Day present; she had wanted to see X-Men Origins: Wolverine, and told us both that was what she wanted for Mother's Day. Naturally, Amy and I were happy to oblige such a simple request.

Although we were both tempted to skip straight to Star Trek and see Wolverine on DVD, we stuck to the plan. I am pleased to report that although I don't think it's quite in the same league as Trek, Wolverine is a worthy addition to the X-Men film canon, and just plain old fun at that. I was never bored, Hugh Jackman carries the movie convincingly, and I genuinely got a kick out of some of the side characters — most especially Remy LeBeau. I have heard Yvonne speak glowingly about Gambit for years, but never knew what the fuss was about until now. I mean, really — how impressive can a guy be who's main power is throwing playing cards at people, anyway?

As it happens, pretty darn. Ably played by Taylor Kitsch, Gambit pretty much picks up the movie and walks away with it every time he's on screen. This is quite a feat, considering that most of his scenes are with Hugh Jackman — the guy who did the same thing every time he was on screen in the original X-Men film. Also particularly noteworthy is Liev Schreiber's Sabretooth. The movie would not have worked if Schreiber had not been as convincing in the role as he was.

So, we're two for two on summer movies this year. I'm doubly happy because, now that we've seen X-Men, the deck is clear for our second crack at Trek, which should take place sometime during Samuel & Aleatha's World Tour 2009.

After that, I don't care what I see. A third viewing of Star Trek, maybe?

I feel young

At 1 o'clock this afternoon, in a moderately nice theater in Martin, Tennessee, all of the waiting finally came to end. With my wife on my right side, and my best friend on my left, I was finally able to see J.J. Abrams re-tooling of the Star Trek mythos that I grew up with. I walked in hoping to like it — even expecting to — and praying that my wife would not have her own childhood too cruelly marred by this new treatment of a series that is beloved to both of us. I cannot adequately put into words what was riding on this film for me, and for my wife. And since you all know me, I'm not really going to try. Instead, I will simply skip ahead to the verdict.

Awesome doesn't begin to describe it.

I don't want to artificially inflate the expectations of those of you who haven't seen the movie yet, since all taste is subjective. But with that firmly in mind, I am happy to report that, for me, this film succeeds on a level that I hadn't expected. It could very easily be the finest Star Trek film ever made; I will need time and perspective, and a lot more repeat viewings, before I can tell. But the early results are promising.

Happily, I am not alone. Yvonne, who was almost afraid to see the film, was beyond delighted, I am happy to say. In fact, I believe she liked the film even more than I did; of course, I was so worried about whether or not she was enjoying it, it was rather like viewing the film with one eye shut. Now that I know we both loved it, all is right with the world, and I will be able to give the film my undivided attention on my next viewing.

Where to begin, and how much to reveal? On the latter point, not much; I will give away no spoilers here. I only ask that when you go see this film that you don't walk in with a lot of preconceptions, and you should do well.

Now, let me spend a few paragraphs talking about what was right with the film, and I will be off for tonight.

For starters, I hereby retract my comments on the new design of the USS Enterprise. As she is lovingly photographed in this movie, Enterprise is a beautiful lady indeed. Maybe it is the angles they chose; maybe it is the glorious amount of detail that is present in her every appearance. But I can honestly say I have never seen a better job of showing off the Enterprise in any of the previous movies. What we see here is not quite as lavish as the five-minute-long reveal she got in Star Trek: The Motion Picture. But pound for pound, it's at least second place.

As for the design, I still have some quibbles about how she looks from some angles, and it's still not my favorite of all of the versions of Enterprise. But as of this moment, all of that is cheerfully forgiven.

I am equally as impressed by the way the actors inhabit their characters; Pine is eminently believable as young Kirk, and Zachary Quinto's Spock is wonderfully complex. Bruce Greenwood's Pike more than lived up to my expectations, and, as anticipated, was one of my favorite parts of the film. Especially praiseworthy was Karl Urban's McCoy, in my opinion, although in point of fact, every single "new" actor did a fine job with their characters. It's not a recreation or pantomime of the original actors; the performances here are new. But at the heart of each performance are the characters we're acquainted with.

As far as the plot goes, I can only tell you that it picks you up at the beginning and carries you along without effort; the whole thing was over before I knew it. There is plenty of action typical to Star Trek. And at the end, all concerned have managed to pull off what I thought was impossible: Star Trek is back.

This movie, in my humble opinion, has managed what several previous additions to the franchise have attempted, but fell short of: they have recaptured some of the youthful spirit of the original Star Trek. By going back to square one with the original characters, and laying the foundation of the their relationships brick by brick, they have come closer to the first two seasons of the classic Star Trek that started it all than any of the other well-meaning efforts since then have managed. Some of it may not seem familiar, and not everyone may like it. But for me, there's no question. The series that I loved as a teenager has successfully been reborn. What I saw this afternoon has only whet my appetite. I cannot wait to see more.

Again, let me close with my usual caveat. The opinions expressed here are only those of one opinionated Jedi Master, and wannabe Starship Captain; your results may vary.

On a more personal note, let me say that the new round of shots, while more painful, have been extremely effective — as I write this, I am virtually pain-free, and am nearly as mobile as I was before I started this little adventure in indolence. Even if the treatments do not last long, I feel we have gotten to the heart of the problem, and that the end is finally in sight.

Add to that a very enjoyable Mother's Day weekend, and you have, all in all, one of my favorite weekends in recent memory. Hope it was the same with you. And, of course, Live Long and Prosper.

I hate waiting...

Doing some virtual pacing again tonight. The verdict from the surgeon, as I think everyone knows, is another type of shot. I leave for Nashville at 3:30 tomorrow morning. I greatly appreciate the support and prayers I've gotten up to this point, including the shout-outs on the last post from the Ohio contingent. I have a feeling of peace about it. Except for the nerves. Which, as I think about it, is perfectly normal. Needles. My spine. Oh, yeah — gimme some more of that.

As a reward for being a big boy, I am planning on seeing the new Trek movie with my wife and best friend the next day. Yvonne has made me aware that I may feel like twenty-five pounds of broken glass the next day, so I am forced to concede that it might be a later date. But I will see it as soon possible. And as soon as I do, I will, of course, let my loyal readers know if it meets my approval.

Until then, adieu.

The necessary preparations

I am keeping watch over my daughter as she stays up entirely too late with homework assignments, and trying not to think too much about the appointment with the surgeon I have tomorrow. Since I'm starting to dislike the fact that I'm only managing one post a month, and that being a rather drawn-out affair, I thought I might try shooting from the hip for a change.

I have achieved a milestone today. I have, for the time being at least, all 79 episodes of the the original Star Trek, as well as the first pilot, on my iPod. Not to mention each of the movies that I currently own on DVD as well. It's a dubious achievement — I mean, really, do you actually need the entire series? Can you possibly watch them all?

The easy answer is no. But there is a method to my madness. I am, by this time really excited about the new Trek movie, which as I write this, debuts in just a few days. In part, having the entire library of classic Trek makes it easy for me to "get back up to speed" on the original series. After so many years, there's a lot I've forgotten. Since I have a lot of time on my hands these days, it also gives me something to fall back on, entertainment-wise.

Also, as someone who used to be dependent on the whims of syndicated television for my weekly fix of Trek, there is something both decedent and powerful about having the entire series in my pocket at my beck and call. It's the iPod syndrome again, I'm afraid.

On a somewhat less pragmatic tack, it is also, in part, fanboy training. The days of work that went into loading the iPod was kind of a geek Mount Everest, and just the sort of senseless and time-consuming work I needed in order to feel like a "real" fan again. Because that's what real fans do — they spend time, money and effort on seemingly silly things, simply because it makes them feel like more of a fan.

Finally, and least logically, it is a good luck charm — a talisman of classic Trek to ward off the specter of what could be another Star Trek V — or worse. In any case, it was what I wanted to do.

And it seems to have taken my mind nicely off of the fact that tomorrow morning I am going to hear of the unknown and permanent things that a perfect stranger plans to do to my spine.

Here's hoping that both the back and the movie turn out well.

The thin line between love and hate

In the past few days, there have been two vital bits of web flotsam that I have been moved by. Both involve the new Star Trek movie, and, between the two of them, they are giving me some very conflicted emotions about this re-imagining.

On the positive side, we have the new Star Trek trailer (images from which come from the ever-faithful trekmovie.com website). This is the third Trek trailer to be released, and they just keep getting better and better. Although nothing, for me, will come close to the anticipation and excitement I felt from seeing the two Phantom Menace trailers, this last Trek trailer punched all of my fan boy buttons big-time. Of particular interest was the first on-screen speech by Captain Pike, whose character has always fascinated me.

I already like this character. I want to know more about Pike, just from hearing a few snatches of dialog. Heck, at this point, they could move the Kirk character into the background, and give the movie to this guy. He looks like a starship captain, and he sounds like a starship captain. As it happens, way more than the new Kirk. But to be fair, the movie is about how Kirk became THE Jim Kirk, so we have to allow for some character development, I suppose.

Speaking of Kirk, another view getting a big fan reaction is our first glimpse of Kirk sitting in the captain's chair for the very first time. The center seat on the bridge has always been a powerful symbol for me, and I once had a beloved poster of William Shatner's Kirk sitting at his rightful place on the Enterprise's bridge. While I don't think this will be taking its place in my heart anytime soon, it's still a pretty cool moment.

Viewers should note that this screenshot is taken as Pine is completing the act of sitting down. So the fact that his head is lowered isn't an indication that he's nodded off on the bridge after a particularly vigorous shore leave. I thought I should point that out, since after all, this is Kirk that we're talking about.

(By the way, I'm assuming it should be patently obvious that I don't own any of the pictures or characters I'm putting up, don't pretend to, that they belong to whatever lucky corporate entity holds their respective copyright, and that I'm not making any money by using them to illustrate my rather rambling points. Pretty please don't sue me).

Anyway, I'm still in the dark how somebody as young as Chris Pine's Kirk gets to sit in the center seat when there are a whole starship full of people who seem to be at least as qualified, if not more so. But if I knew that, I wouldn't need to go see this movie. And, after seeing this trailer, I need to see this movie.

Mind you, I've been led astray by Star Trek trailers in the past. After Star Trek IV came out, I was panting for the next Star Trek movie. And when I saw the trailer for Star Trek V the first time, I was convinced it was going to be just as great as IV, if not better. Imagine, then, my disappointment, when I figured out that it had taken every interesting, exciting or funny moment in an entire two-plus hour film just to make a two minute trailer, and that the remaining umpity-ump seconds should have been left on the cutting room floor. Today, I feel about Trek V the way I feel about bad fan fiction. It never happened. There was no Trek movie between The Voyage Home and The Undiscovered Country.

So, there is precedent for disappointment, but until I am proven wrong by the actual facts, I will remain excited about this movie.

One thing that is already tempering my excitement, though, is this recent image gallery from Quantum Mechanix, which is a replica prop and model house I'm afraid I've never heard of. They were kind enough to post a series of views of their outstandingly detailed model of the new USS Enterprise, giving me for the first time a variety of different angles of this most iconic of ships. And, after a good long look by yours truly, the verdict is in.

I hate it.

I'm not usually one to talk badly about what I don't like about my fandoms. My disdain for the "Jar-Jar haters" is, or should be, the stuff of legend, and I have little patience for people who are supposed to like something, but instead spend all of their time complaining about what doesn't measure up. If you don't like something, that's fine, but don't throw water on my fire. And its possible that someone could find something to love about the new Enterprise. But that someone is not me. So if you don't want me to do that to you, now is the time to stop reading. And whatever you do, you should go to the gallery link above, and draw your own conclusion.

And, just for clarity's sake, the actual QM model is absolutely superb. It is the design the model was based on that I have issues with.

With those caveats out of the way, I can tell you that I only have three main problems — the nacelles, the primary hull and the secondary hull. Since these are the three principle components of the ship, that doesn't leave much left to like.

My biggest problems are the nacelles. The front domes (known as the Bussard collectors to us Trek engineering geeks) are grotesquely huge given the scale of the rest of the ship. Putting them so close together only accentuates this effect. In "Gung Ho," a Michael Keaton comedy about the auto industry, one of the Japanese workers describes a back-heavy 70s-era Chrysler as looking like "a fat American woman in stretch pants." Alas, that is similar to the feeling I get from looking at the new Enterprise's stern.

By contrast, the secondary hull would look sleek and graceful on any other ship. But with the almost-cartoonish look of the warp engines, it looks overwhelmed and out of balance. I say this as an admitted fan of bigger secondary hulls — a fact I will elaborate on in my promised, later post on my favorite Enterprise designs.

But back to this one. The best piece is possibly the circular, or primary, hull. This has historically been my favorite feature of the Enterprise's design. The new one is good, but is so similar to the movie Enterprise's primary as to be almost indistinguishable. The aztec detailing, raised phaser banks and identification fonts are strictly out of the first movie. I loved that design, mind you, but I was hoping for something new; not a re-hash of a thirty year old design.

Taken as a whole, the new ship looks like the movie Enterprise with a bad makeover; not a re-imagining of one of the most beautiful and iconic designs in the whole of science fiction. If I sound slightly miffed, it's because I am one of those fans to whom the Enterprise is one of the main characters. In my entire life, we have only been given six new variations of the original design. Considering how much I have loved some of the past versions, I must admit to being let down by this one. In fact, it may be one of the worst versions of the Enterprise yet conceived. And, for me, if you're going to get something wrong in a Star Trek movie, it had better not be the Enterprise.

I have heard it said that J.J. Abrams told the designers to take the movie and original series models, and combine them. If that's true, then I guess I know who to blame. Hopefully, this will be the only misstep the movie makes. And after some time to get acquainted, maybe the new proportions will grow on me. But right now, it's hard to get past the thought that somebody — maybe even a lot of somebodies — could have done a better job than this.