Shatner May Return to Star Trek (Briefly?) 513
mfh writes "Apparently, William Shatner may return to Star Trek, after talks with studio executives for a cameo on the fourth season of Star Trek: Enterprise. Rick Berman did not disclose which role wants Shatner play, although I'm sure we'd all love to see Captain James Tiberius Kirk again, right?"
No. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:No. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:No. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:No. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:No. (Score:5, Funny)
cLive ;-)
Re:No. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:No. (Score:3, Funny)
Re:No. (Score:3, Funny)
Re:No. (Score:3, Funny)
If you are ever misfortunate enough to watch any of his speeches, you'd see what I mean.
Re:No. (Score:3, Funny)
Re:No. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:No. (Score:5, Funny)
</omg they killed shatner>
Re:No. (Score:5, Funny)
In some UPN Boardroom:
Lackey #1: Uh, sir, there were 42593 people who voted on a popular geek message board, simply said "no" to the whole Kirk on Enterprise deal.
Guy with Cigar: Huh? Those nerds love him, don't they? Why wouldn't they want him back?
Lackey #2: Best we could do dir is bring him back as his own great-grandfather, or maybe as a completely unrelated villian.
Guy with Cigar: But... TIME TRAVEL! TIME TRAVLEL! The WHOLE FUCKING SERIES IS ABOUT TIME TRAVEL! I don't understand... they loved the Next Gen episode with the previous Enterprise from the rift-thing... They loved the DS9 episode with the tribbles, why wouldn't they want Kirk back?
Lackey #1: He's too old and fat, sir.
Lackey number #2 nods, almost unfraid to make eye contact.
Guy with Cigar: "Oh. Well, what else did they say? Maybe we could use this to our advantage..."
Lackey #2: Well, sir, the next highest comment was "I can't believe you still watch Trek. Why is it that Trek can go forever while shows like Firefly and the one with all the muppets on Sci-Fi get cancelled?"
Lackey #1: From there, the conversation degenerated to the Sci-Fi's remake of Battlestar Galactica.
Guy with Cigar: I see... the nerds have abandonded us... maybe we should abandon them. (Picks up Phone) "Jane? Get me Wil Smith on the phone... I want to see if he wants to help produce a new idea I just had... Moesha - the Next Generation."
Re:No. (Score:3, Funny)
That gives me an idea. He comes back as a disembodied head! Of course, they couldn't get away with the whole Futurama floating-in-a-jar thing (which is a consistent theme of Dr. Fun [ibiblio.org], by the way), but surely they could work up some kind of thing where we find out he's the King Borg or something. It's not like consistency is a major concert in the franchise . . . they can always end up
Uh oh (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Uh oh (Score:5, Funny)
Well, it looks like Enterprise is pre-announcing their "Jump the Shark" episode.
Oh well, it was good while it lasted.
Re:Uh oh (Score:4, Funny)
Re: Jumping the Shark (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Jumping the Shark (Score:5, Interesting)
I did generally like TNG and DS9, though. Never watched much of The Original Trek.
I don't really understand why people get so rabid about Star Trek in general, though. It's reasonably fun to watch, yes. It elevates the status of science (well, at least pseudoscience, but one can generally put a plausible interpretation on things) and engineering, which is not very common in the media. There was some good acting -- I really do like Patrick Stewart. The makeup is *very* good. It's interesting to see positive predictions about the future -- a *lot* of movies seem to go in for futuristic dystopias. Finally, for such a long-running set of series, things didn't get too formulaic -- there was definitely good writing.
Re: Jumping the Shark (Score:3, Funny)
You say this as though there's something wrong with it.
Who needs a plot when you have decontamination scenes?
Re: political correctness (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not politically correct drivel, it's mathematically correct fact.
Re: Jumping the Shark (Score:3, Informative)
There is an explanation for TOS klingons.
Tight budget and bad FX.
Fucking Andorians antennae didn't move in TOS though
Re: Jumping the Shark (Score:5, Insightful)
The original series paid no attention to canon, so who cares? They couldn't even keep straight a Romulan versus a Klingon ship, or the name of the planetary federation.
From what I've heard, most of the "canon" broken was never canon to begin with, and only implied in technical manuals, novels and so on. I wouldn't call myself a "trekkie", but I've seen every Star Trek and Next Generation, and I haven't seen anything ridiclous on Enterprise. It's actually cool to see Andorians and non-2D Vulcans.
Re: Jumping the Shark (Score:5, Funny)
Well you heard wrong.
Obsessed Fans Invented Canon (Score:3, Insightful)
As someone has said, get a life.
Re: Jumping the Shark (Score:4, Informative)
*sigh*
Let me say this again--you probably missed the last four or five times I said it on
Enterprise is NOT a prequel to the other four Treks. It's the series that is latest in the timeline, we're just seeing it from a faulty perspective. The Federation won, conquered every threat they had, and achieved time travel--and we're seeing their latest conflict from a POV that we can better emphasize with.
I can sum up the current conflict for you, with oodles of spoilers, and you can tell me how creative you think it is.
A race of aliens, similiar to the wormhole entities of DS9, are using a network of spheres to alter our reality. The far-future Federation was more than capable of defeating these aliens, so the aliens have convinced a five-species "race" known as the Xindi that Earth is a threat, so that the Federation can be undone by a historical cascade.
To counter the Xindi, the temporal Federation alters the timeline by having the NX-01 not be destroyed, but rather explore the galaxy earlier than had otherwise happened.
As for your other complaints--Romulan Cloaking Devices have, IIRC, always existed as far as the canon cares (a few novels notwithstanding), the Klingons have always looked they way they look (a non-canon explanation from Star Fleet Battles is that the Klingons TV-Kirk fought were human/klingon hybrids), and the Borg were logical effects of the assault from First Contact.
Time Travel isn't an afterthought for Enterprise or a gimick. It's essential to the metaplot of the series, and it's easily as creative as TNG, DS9, or Voyager. (Moreso, even, considering that no one else has ever done quite this setup on TV.)
I mean, heck, they have the guy from Quantum Leap as captain--you don't think that's a little bit of a clue that time travel is important to the show?
Re: Jumping the Shark (Score:3, Insightful)
It was introduced to the Federation in Balance of Terror for the first time. This is made very clear.
Since Enterprise is supposed to predate TOS it's badly out of place. The rest of it (Klingon appearance, Borg showing up) I have almost no concern with. The cloaking device thing though's just plain wrong.
Re: Jumping the Shark (Score:5, Funny)
To appreciate a Star Trek show... one must forget that it is Star Trek. How Zen.
Trekkers (Score:3, Insightful)
My absolute favorite trekkies are the ones who get offended if you call them trekkies. "I'm not a trekkie. I'm a trekker". Of all the groups to wrap themselves in Political Correctness, this are easily the most rediculous.
I don't think they ever got over Shatner telling them to Get A Life.
Re:Uh oh (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Uh oh (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Uh oh (Score:5, Funny)
Or?
Re:Uh oh (Score:2)
Can we have Majel Barrett take over operations, as her sci-fi productions have been quality.
Re:Uh oh (Score:5, Funny)
Must warp
Now
Engage
The engines now
Spock!
*Waves hands randomly*
A little old? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:A little old? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:A little old? (Score:5, Funny)
-------
Re:A little old? (Score:3, Funny)
Men wearing corsets make me nervous..
Re:A little old? (Score:2, Funny)
In this episode we have post-Undescovered Country era Kirk, warped into the past via the TEMPERAL COLD WAR to tell Archer that, due to his interference, Kirk never commanded the Enterprise and is now the elderly butler of Chancelor Kelrongolumpha. We get to see touching moments like when Archer tells him to go to hell, thus condeming our former hero to a life serving in HomeEc- just one more change Archer's made in the future timeline.
Re:A little old? (Score:5, Interesting)
Personally, I just want a Q plot line.
Re:A little old? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Bring back Q! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Bring back Q! (Score:5, Insightful)
Writer 1: "Darn, I really hate doing sci-fi movies. I wish we could do some historical fiction for a change."
Writer 2: "Yes, I've always wanted to do something on the Civil War."
In Unison: "Q!"
Re:Bring back Q! (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, Q definitely was a deus ex machina.
Dammit Jim! The whole franchise is about creating a problem and then solving it in 10 minutes through any of the dozen spare deus ex machina they might have lying around.
grumble...grumble...bring back Babylon 5...grumble...
Re:Bring back Q! (Score:5, Insightful)
Q can be taken as the literal hand of God. He can wave said appendage and create any effect, at any time, including changing the laws of physics throughout the entire universe. You can spend half your lifetime crawling through space in a tin can and then have Q throw a hissy fit and "poof" you back to where you started.
It reduces humanity to below the level of ants, in its own eyes, and rightly so. The existence of Q means there's little point to doing more than porno on the holodeck, and Q could even ruin that if he wanted to.
Bring back Q? Q is what made me stop watching in the first place because, as per above, he renders the whole exercise pointless.
KFG
Re:Bring back Q! (Score:3, Funny)
"We were looking for a way to make the ratings soar So we orchestrated an encounter with the Borg Normally you'd think that that would get us into shit But this one has a smashing ass and a lovely set of tits"
Re:A little old? (Score:3, Interesting)
Of course, in theory, nobody will care who he is or who his children will become... but with all those time traveling weirdos, they can think of some story line of where he has to save himself (and the enterprise), so that his grand children father Kirk... or something.
oh... and KHAAAAAN!!! could also be part of the story...
Re:A little old? (Score:3, Informative)
Heh, that had one of the funniest "in jokes" I've seen on TV, the episode where Lithgow et al. meet Shatner at an airport, and on being asked about the trip, he mentions thinking he saw gremlins on the wing. The other sympathizes "yes, that's happened to me".
Went over many people's heads, but then I'd seen both the original Twilight Zone episode and the TZ movie where Shatner (pre-Trek) and Lithgow (pre-3rd Rock), respectively, played the
A new dose of life! (Score:5, Insightful)
Bringing back James Kirk could breathe new life back into the series: after all, that's how it all started. Even just William Shatner playing someone else might do the trick.
We need old blood more than new blood.
Re:A new dose of life! (Score:5, Interesting)
The only thing that would save this show would be to cancel the show and have a final episode where an Ensign Daniels walked out of a holodeck on Enterprise-D, to be railed on about historical inconsistencies by Data.
I don't recognize any of the movies after First Contact either, so forget about B-4.
Re:A new dose of life! (Score:5, Interesting)
The Enterprise time line starts after the Enterprise-E visited Earth in First Contact. That little bit of info can be used to correct a lot of 'inconsistencies' in Enterprise, including when exactly they meet a lot of races such as the Klingons. Things are further complicated by the whole temporal cold war thing.
As for cloaking devices etc, well I dunno. Never watched much of ToS. I'm not defending that bit.
Re:A new dose of life! (Score:4, Insightful)
You should pitch that as the final episode.
Seriously.
Re:A new dose of life! (Score:5, Insightful)
Of late? Star Trek has been formulaic ever since TNG hit the screens. Just watching reruns of Voyager, you can see the same patterns over and over again, that were in TNG, DS9 and the original.
Meanwhile, truely groundbreaking and interesting programs like Firefly only last for one series before being axed :(
Re:A new dose of life! (Score:3, Interesting)
It's true. But of all the series, I've grown to like DS9 more than the others. For one, at the start of the series they were in this clapped out station, and certainly weren't in the same position of power the previous series had seen the central characters in. The later series had story arcs - imagine that! A story that was really carried from episode to episode. No other series has had that (well, Voyager had a
Re:A new dose of life!....for Firefly (Score:4, Insightful)
You're wrong. Andromeda (Lexa Doig... or something like that) is damn hot
Re:A new dose of life! - completely new.. (Score:4, Insightful)
I originally thought that Scott Bacula would make a good captian, but he doesn't. All his dialogue seems forced. The first officer is even more annoying; he's a terrible actor and the character doesn't help him out any being a country bumpkin mechanic/first officer/chief engineer.
They could probably get away with holding on to some of the of the cast, but they need to change the characters quite a bit. The crew of the ship is supposed to be like a Navy ship, that's what the heirarchy is supposed to mirror. These characters are so unprofessional that they would all be kicked out of the Navy in a moment. Now, I know it's the future and everything is all roses but c'mon..
In The Next Generation, the crew was definately more loose then the US navy, but you definately had more of a feel of the chain of command and the characters behaved like the officers they were.
I'm just not interested in these characters. They have very little depth. You don't feel as though you know them at all, even after a few years of being on the air.
Maybe I just miss the Picard/Riker duo. Or maybe it's because ever since UPN took over Star Trek it just hasn't been good. Voyager wasn't that good, and neither is this one. It also doesn't help that UPN puts in commercials every 4 minutes. TNG and DS9 were both very good shows, from the pre-UPN era.
Oh well. They will just never be able to bring back the quality and popularity of TNG. TNG was once the most popular TV show on the planet; Enterprise does all it can do just to stay on the air.
Re:A new dose of life! - completely new.. (Score:3, Interesting)
Think of them as more like the the army air force test pilots. Ever seen "the right stuff"? Those guys were a li
Re:A new dose of life! - completely new.. (Score:5, Funny)
We're talking about Star Trek and you're all complaining about the quality of the acting?!?
Ohhh the irony!!!
J.T. Kirk = More Bloody Time Travel - No Thanks! (Score:3, Insightful)
>>into an old formula that is fast making me lose
>>interest. Bringing back James Kirk could breathe
>>new life back into the series:
The only problem with bringing back Kirk is that it will, by necessity, involve yet another freakin' time-warp episode. This is, by definition, more of the same ol' crap. There's an entire rich and diverse world of sci-fi literature out there that doesn't involve time travel that is just waiting to be ri
Re: A new dose of life! (Score:5, Funny)
Re: A new dose of life! (Score:3, Interesting)
Would it really be 'jumping the shark' if Shatner played Kirk's dad/granddad?
Hmmmmm.....Priceline...... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Hmmmmm.....Priceline...... (Score:3, Insightful)
I say we toast the cast of Enterprize with some Iocaine powder.
ancestor... (Score:4, Interesting)
Urrrr... (Score:5, Funny)
As much as I'd like to see my grandma appear on new episodes of Baywatch...
Re:Urrrr... (Score:3, Funny)
Overlay (Score:2)
Final Nail in the Coffin (Score:3, Insightful)
If you really new ST history (Score:3, Funny)
And yes, I did make that up just now.
My thoughts: (Score:4, Funny)
Oh, wait...
Bring back Bones instead! (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Bring back Bones instead! (Score:2, Funny)
They'll bring him back, but.. at what.. cost?
Good for him (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Good for him (Score:5, Funny)
My God, man! How can you say that about him after seeing his inspired acting on T. J. Hooker and the amazing hosting abilities displayed on Rescue 911! With such versatility, I would be surprised if he couldn't sing just as well, too!!!
Why bring back kirk? (Score:3, Funny)
And quasi-evil goati wearing evil spock too!
Technobabble (Score:5, Funny)
I'm looking forward to seeing Shatner (Score:4, Interesting)
It could work... (Score:3, Interesting)
Shatner can play Kirk's great-grandfather...
He doesnt have to be the young sex symbol anymore, he can be an old space dog.
In this economy (Score:4, Funny)
Well, he needs the work since he was fired from Priceline.com. [clickz.com]
The fact that he's found new work so quickly is a sure sign that the economy really is on the rebound...
Star Trek The Next Generation (Score:2)
Please don't .. (Score:4, Insightful)
Enterprise is my favorite star trek franchise series don't mess it up please !
Pity or Annoyance? (Score:3, Insightful)
All of that said, Shatner's milked the Star Trek thing long enough. Milking a role 10 years after a show ends might be ok for awhile, but the original Star Trek has been gone for a LONG time. The Johnny Carson show was as good as Star Trek, but you don't see Carson showing up everytime someone opens the curtains.
He's had a full life - he should stop embarrassing himself. There's nothing unique about a 1-role actor. He's a nice guy, but really... bury the role, and try something else.
Re:Pity or Annoyance? (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually, if you ever see him interviewed, he wishes people would stop talking about Star Trek.
There's nothing unique about a 1-role actor.
That's the thing - he feels totally trapped by the Kirk role. He wishes that a) he could do something else and b) people would want to talk about anything else he's done. It's not fair to him to suggest he's "milking" his role as Kirk, I think he almost wishes he'd never taken it.
This gives me an idea!! (Score:4, Funny)
What Enterprise Needs... (Score:5, Interesting)
While I didn't like the ongoing story line this past season, they could turn it around (noticed a little of that the past couple of weeks). If they bring the Xindi in as allies of the humans against the sphere builders, that could start things in the right direction for the Federation (gotta get the Vulcans involved first, though).
I did like some of the stories this season too, especially the one about Trip's clone and the one with Archer's quantum brain injury. Very creative.
Re:What Enterprise Needs... (Score:3, Insightful)
And I think that had I been in charge, the plots would be more cerebral and less action-packed. They basically took a bunch of characters and put them on a ship roaming the universe. This is dumb because the plot is the same every week; Go to planet, get in trouble, get out of trouble, and go to another planet.
DS9 is rapidly becoming my favorite Trek because it has done so much with its premise. Conflicts between Bajoran and Cardassian, the politics of reconstructing a world that ha
A slight problem (Score:3, Insightful)
Not as Kirk (Score:5, Insightful)
Having Shatner appear as James T. Kirk would be the final straw that would have me petition to have the "Star Trek" taken back out of the show's title, the show disowned as part of the Trek franchise, and a price taken out on Rick Berman's head.
I mean, come on. Kirk is in his what, 30s or 40s during the TOS series? Enterprise is set over a century before (early 2150s vs. late 2260s). Even with the overreliance on screwing with the timeline that Berman is so fond of, there's no way to make that work. Besides, Shatner himself is in his 70s now. He'd have to be playing an extremely old Kirk sent back in time or something. Of course, Kirk already died in Veridian III ("Generations").
Whoever speculated that Shatner would be playing Kirk either has an even lower opinion of Berman than I do (which is saying a great deal), or is even more of a moron than Berman and Braga (which is saying even more).
Shatner cameo (Score:3, Insightful)
Come on! (Score:5, Insightful)
- who didn't want to be Kirk, tooling around the galaxy getting it on with alien chicks in nearly every episode?
- who didn't want to kiss Nichelle Nicholls?
- who didn't want to fight aliens on a regular basis, always win, get the girl and only token injuries, then do it all again next week?
- who didn't want to be boss of the Enterprise? Not some toy Apollo mission, this is the Enterprise!!!!
- who didn't want to have Spock as a buddy? Spock, the guy who knows everything, is super strong and would *never* horn in on your action
And, somehow, he did all this despite an almost total lack of acting ability. Even as a kid, I knew all those dialog
Bring him back, bring him back now. Cram the TV schedule with Shatner, and bring hope to a new generation of kiddies!
Re:Totally agreed. (Score:3, Insightful)
It was but they took it to the next level. The first interracial kiss on TV Nov. 22, 1968 took place between Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner) and Lt. Uhura (Nichelle Nichols) on an episode of "Star Trek."
Traveller (Score:3, Funny)
Romulans, maybe? (Score:3, Interesting)
or maybe he plays a human that brings about the Romulan Wars?
("Star Trek Chronology" 2nd ed. places the Romulan Wars in 2156. Enterprise 3rd season ends in 2154.)
Yes to Shatner; No to Kirk (Score:3, Insightful)
Shatner is a fine actor. He always brings something to the part. I love the orginal series. However, Kirk is f*cking dead. Ditto Spock. Ditto Scotty. I wish Berman would stop masturbating about action-figure sales and put PLOT first. Tell interesting stories. Have the characters make interesting choices. KILL a few of them.
That's a spicy meatball!
Hmm... (Score:5, Funny)
Did Yoda get a job as a Slashdot editor when I wasn't paying attention?
Clarification (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Clarification (Score:5, Insightful)
In a word, yes I do call it science fiction.
Science fiction is not about portraying the future, and future cultures accurately. Or trying to be an oracle of what cool gadget you can expect 2022. Or at least not always and certainly not exclusively.
Science Fiction is fiction where the many a varied topics explored in fiction have, as a setting, or a tool to explote, Science and science like themes and props.
Somtimes, by placing todays issues in another framework, they can be exposed and examined in ways a more familiar setting might make to uncomfortable to otherwise delve into. Science fiction by it's nature fits this role well.
Take for example the episode (sorry I have NOT memorized all the titles/scripts/etc.) people who had one half of thier face white and the other half black are engaged in constant conflict based on WHICH half is which color.
The enterprise crew didn't even realize the distinction existed untill it was explained to them.
This episode was clearly a morality play on racism, and the pointlessness thereof. Had, say a cop show, tried to make the same point, it would never have aired in the late sixties do to the climate back then.
This isn't just a Startrek thing. Many Science Fiction shows, and even shows about the far past, have commented on modern society.
Science fiction isn't just about flying cars and green women and rayguns.
Mycroft
Re: Shatner Back in StarTrek (Score:5, Funny)
> As Shatner is to Startrek as Bill Gates is to home computers.
A monocle and a persian cat away from being a James Bond villian?
Re:Nimoy's campaign contributions (Score:3, Insightful)
The Federal Election Commission frowns very heavily on accepting campaign contriubtions from foreign nationals.
Re:Shatnerism (Score:3, Interesting)
about those ratings....
i live in Idaho. as such, the only access i would have to the series is by satellite TV - which isn't all that cheap. digital cable is much preferred here. so, everyone in town that i know (which is most of the town, btw) has either never seen the show because they don't get it on TV or isn't a trekkie at all.
if Enterprise hadn't been handed to UPN, it would most definitely have more viewership. as it is, though, you have to know someone with satellite TV that carries UPN or you