Who holds the "Star Trek" torch for today?

Space..the final frontier..and a endless area to play out all of our hopes and fears through science fiction.

Space trekking fantasys have been part of popular culture ever since we started pondering the stars as more than just twinkling torches above our head and a curiousity as to what new adventures await our race..

In 1966, a real attempt at creating a running narrative on this experience came out on television called Star Trek. This was not the first space film out there mind you, But the difference was it was not marketed as a cowboys V indians fest.
The creator wanted a multilevel product that not only allowed for action, but also had a moral point per episode. This was to be a gullivers travel verses a gunsmoke adventure.

The series employed very controversial aspects, from a multiracial crew (this was argued against quite hotly, but Roddenbury ultimately told them to go stuff it, this is a enlightened future, not a bunch of racists in ships). Also there was his progressive agenda that permeated many of his shows and overarching theme, such as anti-war merits (during the time of the Vietnam war) woman equality (Kirk frowns at sexual harassment laws however) and a multitude of things that by todays standard would seem common, but in 66, would seem treading on outrage at the suggestion to staunch traditionalists.


Since then, seemingly every generation has had its "space saga". Be it star wars (although never a satisfactory weekly series..sorry late 70s/80s) , Stargate, and even arguably firefly (although that lacked much of the depth and series to series deeper subject matter presented..and was cut after 1 season because of ??? anyhow).
Battlestar Galactica most certainly held the title for pretty much every season it was on.


There doesn't seem to be much on today for the space saga mantle...or is there?
Seems with the lack of quality on television, people are eyeing the gaming industry and their amazing feats that quite often put traditional media to shame in its content, context, depth, and even special effects.

Its time we start putting games into this market due to lack of content..

But who:
Star Trek? They are making new series...sadly, they lost their way and are catering to making fun space movies for a trendy tween audience. Not that this is a bad thing mind you, but you don't hand over the "star trek" torch simply to the brand just for namesake..it meant something..it was a connection to the crew, the lessons, both grim and joyful learned over time, the nerdy yet curiously close to real theories that makes you wonder if they are letting us in on a secret, etc...sorry new star trek movies coming out, you don't fill the shoes left by your formers...you are somewhere in between spaceballs and the last starfighter. Even your games are sub-standard and lacking creativity.

Dead Space? Personally I say no..its kill monsters, run around shooting stuff in a panic situation the whole time, but I know if I don't at least put it up, somebody will murder my face off. Good game series, but not much depth outside of the basics, and ultimately its just a horror movie series with space as an incidental backdrop.

I would suggest Mass Effect is most certainly in the lead here for "todays Star Trek". Popular Mechanics Agrees here
Also my personal favorite choice (should the franchise continue). A movie is due out about the first game...this has many game fans worried (similar worry to LOTR fans when they said they were going to make the trilogy into movies..lots of fear they would slaughter its depth)

Dr. Who: Maybe...bit heavy on the humor and light on the overall depth. Still, it does draw that certain cult audience and occasionally pushes a new line of thinking.


I feel I am missing a big one (be it deep gaming franchise that is truely cutting edge technology mixed with powerful storyline that isn't 100% serious or fps. Incidently, anyone whom suggests gears of war or anything anime must spend 20 minutes in the room of blades and fire)

So, your suggestions then as to where old trekkers can go to become engrossed in space once again, the joys, the sorrows, the geekdom tempered with some good cowboy action now and then?

Or just want to complain about lack of quality space/future entertainment due to the dumbing down of the western culture...?

I am a fan extreme of anything Trek, and have been since I was a little one (wayyy loing ago lol) Even have a closet full of my precioussssses... i.e. ST collectables.

Where to go now? **sigh** iI wish I knew, honestly. There's been dang little to catch the same lind of magic Trek awlays did for me.

Galactica came close but it's a different breed than Trek. More of a survivalist space fantasy as opposed to a far-reaching exploration type of space fantasy.

I'm afraid the vast majority of studios arent willing to risk this type of thing much anymore. The reality tv trend has done nothing but grow, because it's exceedingly cheap and easy to create content and keeps the masses happy for some reason lol
**sigh** Ok thre is my lament

Originally posted by Jomina
I am a fan extreme of anything Trek, and have been since I was a little one (wayyy loing ago lol) Even have a closet full of my precioussssses... i.e. ST collectables.

Where to go now? **sigh** iI wish I knew, honestly. There's been dang little to catch the same lind of magic Trek awlays did for me.

Galactica came close but it's a different breed than Trek. More of a survivalist space fantasy as opposed to a far-reaching exploration type of space fantasy.

I'm afraid the vast majority of studios arent willing to risk this type of thing much anymore. The reality tv trend has done nothing but grow, because it's exceedingly cheap and easy to create content and keeps the masses happy for some reason lol
**sigh** Ok thre is my lament

I agree.
Hense why I had to toss in a video game title to pick the torch up.
Incidently, if you haven't yet, you really, really want to pick up the mass effect games..totally brings back that love of space and wonder of it all while meeting (and doing) interesting new species...kirk had green girls, shepherd had blue girls

I sort of feel the same way about Galactica...it was epic..amazing..but, the galaxy was empty (well, except for the robots on their arse) and it was dark..very dark...grim through and through and a large degree of hopelessness verses the trek "hope" feel, even when the worst was breathing down their neck.

i guess there are still re-runs of babylon 5 you could watch!!!!
checkoff is a traitor!

Originally posted by reficul
i guess there are still re-runs of babylon 5 you could watch!!!!

checkoff is a traitor!

I don't know why I never got much into that series..watched it when it first came on...but, not sure..didn't hold the draw.
I did quite like Farscape..that was pretty good, and had one of my favorite crushes in it(Claudia Black).

But both of them are long gone now (series that is..might as well dust off STTNG). hard to say a series that no longer is on should hold the torch today.

Just some thoughts.

It is interesting to note how limited some of these shows were.

In the 60s Roddenbury put together a talented team to write the series.

The best they came up for communication was Kirks flip phone. Compare that with today's mobile phone. While Spock had his rather large scanner there were no photos / videos, no real time monitoring. No data storage, just a flip phone.

Of course Kirk had his phaser. Sometimes it even disintegrated his opponent, mostly it didn't.

The ship was always needing repairs. Eye Captain! The effectiveness of the weapons varied episode to episode.

I always wanted a little more consistency between episodes.

The Next Generation was a little better at the tech but still fell way short of what I thought the series should have. Having read the Brainship Series from Anne MacCaffrey perhaps I ws expecting more.

I know that a Pilot episode existed with very strange controls but this was thought of as too extreme.

Of course we always had the writers boo boos to deal with as well. Out of phase people that walked through walls but still used the turbo lifts as just one example.


Battlestar Galactica suffered from over use of the same film sequences. It didn't take long to tire of the fight scenes. Both series suffered from two dimensional battle scenes as well as the dramatic and unbelievable high speed turns that just don't happen in space.

Blakes Seven (First series) was a low budget production that I thought fixed most of these problems. The series went to pot after Blake left. With a decent budget this could have been a real winner.


I loved all these shows, just thought they could have had a bit more realism.

P

reply to post by SaturnFX


i'm sorry,i guess you didn't get my sarcasm!
babylon 5 has to be one of the worst 'space' shows of all time!!!
whatever happened to the new 'V' series? looked like it had potential.
i just finished watching the 'new' star trek movie (again!) and i think they did a good job on that.
i really don't watch too much tv so i dont know what space programs are on the boob tube!

Originally posted by reficul
reply to post by SaturnFX

 

i'm sorry,i guess you didn't get my sarcasm!

babylon 5 has to be one of the worst 'space' shows of all time!!!
whatever happened to the new 'V' series? looked like it had potential.
i just finished watching the 'new' star trek movie (again!) and i think they did a good job on that.

i really don't watch too much tv so i dont know what space programs are on the boob tube!

ok, so I wasn't the only one that thought Bab5 was trash. Be surprised how many think it was some epic show...I thought it started out conceptually alright, but..you can only have soo many quirky characters before it turns into little more than a skit comedy verses a serious space drama.

V was good...I have no clue why it was cancelled...then again, I am not sure why half the quality television shows get cancelled. I think the nation is adapting to a nascar mentality in their viewing habits (drive fast, turn left..aka:easy to follow)

reply to post by SaturnFX


Firefly, although not really in the same vein as Star Trek could have...no, should have been a huge success.

Great cast.

Great writing.

Great director.

But it wasn't to be.

Serenity was fantastic too, I'm glad Joss got to make it.

Another show that I thought was underrated was Space: Above and beyond

Only lasted a season as well.

I think in a few years we might see a new Star Trek series, hopefully in the same vein as TNG, DS9 and Voyager.

Hey, Babylon 5 was most certainly NOT trash.
While the "stars" of the show were meh, it's the secondary cast that made for a great story, Ambassador Mollari, Citizen J'Kar, etc...
It obviously lacked the necessary funds to get to it's full potential but it wasn't trash...

reply to post by SaturnFX


I didn't read all the replys but did skim through a few and I believe people are missing your point. Star Trek at it's time influenced how America and humanity in general viewed space and its possiblities. And I feel the show that's generating that same kind of result today would be the History Channel's Ancient Alien series. For young people just coming up this show will be a very real influence in how they will form their world...er, universal views.....just as Star Trek did for my generation.

The 2009 V series just didn't have the heart that the original V miniseries had. I really like Morena Baccarin though. She looked her hottest when she was in Stargate SG 1. (pun intended for those who've seen the series).