More Proof J. J. Abrams Doesn’t Get Star Trek

They launched the new Star Trek Movie site today, and it provided me with all the proof I need to see how little J. J. Abrams does not understand Star Trek at all.

As you can see on the right, the story is that an egotist and a bunch of people who have never done anything that could be described as good or great have come together to overlay their vision onto a classic series that they have mistaken as nothing but a space adventure.

I have talked at length about how little the new team seems to understand about the depth and power of the original series in their attempt to turn Star Trek into Star Wars (read it here).  This very problem has plagued Trek since Gene Roddenberry died (read more on that here).

Gene Roddenberry on idea of Star Trek, it had action, adventure, wants and needs, but it also tackled all of the most important issues of the day.

This has always been what set Star Trek apart from all of the other Space Operas that have been on Television before or since with the sole exception of Babylon 5.  Action/adventure shows are fleeting.  No other show has engendered the devotion and admiration of so many people.  It didn’t accomplished because it had an action episode from time to time.  It did this because the shows stood for something.

Gene talking about how he resisted the studio's push for Star Trek to be nothing more than an Action Adventure series. It had to be about so much more.

It wasn’t easy for me to listen to Gene talking about Star Trek.  I hope it will not be as bad as it could be, but so far, Abrams and the rest have given me no reason for hope.  This feels like the forces that wanted Star Trek to be a vacant series, devoid of merit have taken advantage of Gene to slowly bleed out of the series everything Gene fought to keep in.  This film, if it is what it looks like, would be the second film to betray Gene’s vision.

Check out my Star Trek Review.