Shatner fans might be disappointed, as he could not have more than a cameo appearance unless a substantial rewrite were to occur. His ship has already sailed, so to speak, so don’t expect miracles. This movie will stand very well on its own without him, albeit on some of the ground he created.

About the spoilers we’ve all seen? Let’s just say they’re probably worth exactly what we paid for them.

How did First Contact break the Borg cannon???? It only enhanced it (IMO).

Star Trek cannon (IMO) isn’t set in stone. There’s gonna be changes some big some small. That’s just life.
If Abrams goes too far and turns it into (buffy the Star Trek wonder years) it will be reflected in the product and the fans will let him know he sucks by not attending the film.
I’m not crying cannon fodder, I’m saying make a good Star Trek film you hack or I and millions of us will all tell you (collectivly like the borg) that you SUCK if you blow it…. That make sense?
Btw only thing I like of JJ;s was Cloverfield. Lost,Mi3 and Alias are all crap to me.
(So there ya go).

Yea Bill, Robert April was the first Captain then it was Pike then Kirk. (Archer was the first Captian of the Enterprise NX-01). A significantly primative version of the Constitution class vessel. (And a ship only Rick Berman could love).

As far as I remember the Enterprise was refit after Pike and then Kirk took over and began his 5 year mission. The reason 5 years is because Roddenberry wanted to go 5 seasons. I’m not sure that book you have is accurate. I’ve heard Gene say himself in interviews that he wanted Star Trek to go 5 season’s hence the mission statement.

Its clear from what I know that the next film will show the changing of the guard so to say with Pike and Kirk.
To say anymore would be a spolier alert. All hands to delete keys!!!

“Jumped the quark” – haven’t heard that one, but interesting, thanks 790.

First Contact et al had some implausible scenarios, but in my opinion “breaking canon” means breaking something related to the original series. First Contact changed the Borg, but didn’t break the Borg, IMHO.

BTW, I think I was incorrect on something significant – wasn’t the very first captain of the Enterprise Robert T. April? Next came Archer, then Pike. Kirk was next to sit in the command chair when he was 30 years old (ST:TOS starts during Year 4 of the 5 Year Mission). This is according to “The Star Trek Guide“, Roddenberry’s guide to writers for the original series.

In the Star Trek world Bill we call it “jumped the quark”.
Personally Star Trek breaks cannon a lot. (In the case of First Contact) I don’t think that really happened because of the examples you gave.
(IMO) Star Trek “jumped the quark” with the film “Insurrection”.

(Also I think the fans WERE upset with killing off Data…
Nemesis had its good and bad parts but I think it was clear that Brent Spiner was getting to old to play a robot that didn’t age.)

Paramount, really never “Got” Star Trek. Its hard to tell why Rick Berman went with the Insurrection storyline however if anything killed the Star Trek momentum that was it.
(IMO).

I only saw Nemesis once, on cable. I didn’t see it in the theater after I read all the poor reviews that said there were holes in the plot big enough to drive an Excelsior-class starship through it. I saw it on cable, and I remember jumping more than once at either a ridiculous lack of continuity or an “Aw, C’mon!” moment of disappointment.

This is a very interesting article I came across:

Star Trek Jumped the Shark

It claims that ST jumped the shark with First Contact.

Jump the Shark refers to when a series something either does something so impossible, or breaks continuity, in such a way that fans are too disappointed to watch the show again. One of the prime examples was the Bobby Ewing Shower Scene on the hit TV series Dallas. It treated fans like they were stupid AND shattered continuity like a glass chandelier dropped from an airplane. Dallas never recovered.

ST: First Contact changed Zefram Cochrane, totally changed the Borg, created totally implausible scenarios – look, when Data was later killed off and nobody cared, that’s a sign that Paramount really broke faith with the fans.

Nemesis, yeah everyone hated that film. I liked it. I thought it was ok. It did have some great space battles that I still love to pop in and watch after a bad day at work.

I don’t think Abhrams is going to screw up TOS that much. Sure the ship and uniforms will prob be a little different but what do you expect.

I’m really upset more with the abandonment of TNG Ds9 and Voy timline.

And no, we don’t have to live through the reboot because we don’t have to go to the movie, or buy the DVD, if this turns out to be another Nemesis.

Don’t get me wrong – I’m hoping for a terrific movie with the continuity that has made Star Trek a smashing success. But Nemesis disillusioned The Original Generation of fans. It’s a hard sell for people past 40, so I’m concerned that Paramount will pull another Nemesis; problem is, a cast of young, arrogant kids rarely succeeds in Sci-Fi movies.

You know, if anyone at Paramount was daring enough, they could put out an exciting film on The Chronicles of Chris Pike. The only continuity that would be required would be technology, and Spock’s character. Since the rest of Pike’s bridge crew was mostly undeveloped in ST:TOS, Paramount could play with the crew as they wished. According to Spock (and my original edition Star Trek Concordance!) Spock served with Pike as Captain of the Enterprise for an exciting “eleven years, four months, five days”. That’s enough time for a new series! And it could easily revive The Great Bird’s vision of “Horatio Hornblower to the Stars”.

All it would take is a good writer that stays away from Paramount’s constant use of the Godfather Formula – youngster succeeds his mentor, youngster battles for position, youngster is betrayed, then vindicated etc (you see this in many of Paramount’s films and it is used when it shouldn’t).

Please excuse my rants – ST:TOS has always been more of a morality play to me than a science-fiction series, where the people were the story and not the props. I’ve already seen how my beloved Amber series by Zelazny was horribly disfigured by an openly mercenary writer. I’m hoping the same doesn’t happen to Trek.

I’m glad at least Paramount put out all the Star Trek shows on dvds.

Berman by the way sure gets a lot of blame on his Star Trek shows. Personally I loved TNG, DS9, Voy, and (deep breath) Enterprise.
Sure they wernt perfect but they were Star Trek.
And all take the worst episode of Enterprise over ANY reality show or any CSI crapfest any day.

And Bill please I can’t take anymore threads that begin with (working shatner in the film).

Anyone associated with the film is CONTRACTUALLY OBLIGATED to not say anything bad about it. So, the moment Nimoy siged on the dotted line, Paramount could have revisioned history so that the Enterprise is a garbage scow and Chris Pike’s command was just a dream by Bobby Ewing, and Nimoy would have been obligated to say “I’m excited by the new possibilities” or forfeit everything he’s paid on the project.

As far as not signing Shatner – trust me, Bill doesn’t need the money because he’s a very wealthy man (and Nimoy certainly isn’t).

If you want to know the truth about Nimoy and Shatner, you’ll have to trust Gene Roddenberry’s own words. The Great Bird of the Galaxy wrote a wonderfully revealling book, “The Making of Star Trek” which explains how Shatner’s ego rubbed everyone the wrong way. Roddenberry has a funny way with words when describing his creation (real excerpt: “Klingon’s fart in air lockers“)

As far as forcing out Berman – look, in Hollywood, Ego is everything, and the dollar is a distant second. If Berman has a contractual NDA, until it expires, he’s restricted as to what he can say. If he’s not under an NDA, mouthing off virtually guarantees that he’ll never work in that town again.

That scene in particular made me cringe.
Teen angst makes me wanna puke.

Kel WRONG
{{Great work, 790! }}

It’s the Transformers over-the top [literally] scene where Mikaela’s boobs almost pop out of her shirt as she caresses the engine, and Sam’s eyes almost pop out of his head as he thinks of getting the car a paint job.

Only the names were changed:

Oh nice headers. You got a high rise double pump carburetor–that’s pretty impressive.
…..D-d–double pump?
It squirts the fuel in so you can go faster.
…..I like to go faster.

And Paramount would have thought 20 times before getting rid of Berman because he had and still owns a big chunk of the creative piece of the Next Generation, Yoyager and Star Trek Enterprise.

No one plays by the rules in this town….. Its cutthroat.
Conspiraces happen daily.

I think the studio was responsable for green lighting Star Trek scripts they knew woundt loose money but certainly wouldn’t garnish a new fanbase.
And another reason they didn’t want any Next Gen films after Berman is because they would had to pay and include him.

Those two films did not have the balance of the most successful ST films (2,4,6 and First Contact). Those films had an excitement and humor that played to a wide audience, not just the Star Trek fans. Star Trek may get you an opening weekend (Nemisis and Insurrection opened decently), but without strong word of mouth that will draw in the non fans…who just want to see a good movie…they bombed.

Vic

I read one treatment that had the Federation grappling with Section 31’s handling of Voyagers advanced technology. (They wanted to secretly advance all Federaton ships with the tech) but the Romulans find out about it and its about to damage the peace talks with the Romulans. Meenwhile USS Titan uncovers a space anomoly that turns into a gateway the Mirror Borg are secretly developing to refortify the Borg in our muiltiverse.
This all culminates into a huge epic that brings a lot of Next Gen favorites back together.
There plan was to do this film as a intro for a new tv show that would have come afterwards.

BUT
Paramount said “no we don’t want to resign any of those actors”.

So I’ll be there for this new venture but if it sucks, Wow the perfect shtstorm is going to rock paramount.

I’m not saying that the later incarnations of Trek don’t have fans. What I am trying to say is that they just don’t have a fan base that would justify a $100M film that is meant to REBOOT the entire STAR TREK franchise.

Yes, I think that all of these later incarnations (including Enterprise) were very good. However, as great as they are to the fans, they simply are not ICONIC. However, the original series was (and still is) iconic. A film based upon the original series and movies has the potential to attract fans and those who would watch it because of the Trek nostalgia.

For a Trek film with a $100M budget, Paramount needs approximately 20 million people in the US to watch the film (given the median ticket price of $5 a pop). Would 20 million people watch a film based upon ST:DS9 or ST:Voyager? I just don’t think so. If the last Trek film was poorly received by everyone except the most ardent ST:TNG fans — I have a difficult time believing that even 5 million people would attend a film based upon the later franchises.

Paramount is really placing all of their eggs in one basket. They are hoping that this film will earn at least $175-$200 Million in the United States alone — and advance the popularity of Trek in this new global film economy. However, if this film performs poorly (or barely breaks even), it may place the final nail in the Trek franchise (at least, for 10 years).

I am hoping for this film to succeed as a work of art. I hope that the writers/directors/actors etc… will do their best to carry the Trek franchise well into the 21st Century. If they can, then this film will be an economic catalyst for future Trek projects (and possibly, projects involving the later TV incarnations). Who knows? If this film is popular enough, perhaps a new Trek franchise could be created for the small screen?

I have a great deal of faith in JJ Abrams. He is a fan of sci fi. He worked wonders with Alias and LOST (although to a lesser extent with LOST). MI:3 was a great film in its own right — and probably would have raked in a fortune had it not been for the controversy surrounding Cruise and Scientology. Cloverfield was truly unique and well received. So I think that Abrams is quite able to do well with this franchise. As a fan of the first eight movies (Star Trek 5 notwithstanding), I am certainly crossing my fingers!

Paramount expected “Insurrection” to bomb and ruin TNG but enough fans put up with it.
Then Paramount approved the script for Nemesis and. Bam I sunk your battleship.
Berman was gone within a few years and I think that was the mission all along.

Remember gang, Paramount has last word on any Star Trek projects. They approve or tell them rewrite it.