SyFriday: More Things Change, More They Stay The Same

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If you're a diehard Star Trek fan, you're probably not going to like what I'm about to say, but since when did I care if people actually like what I said or not? In any event, they can change the Enterprise all they want ... but in the end, what matters is that the Enterprise is there, not what it looks like.

It can be absolutely unnerving to see changes taking place on the bridge, or in corridors, or (gasp!) even in the engine room. But how is that any more unnerving than having completely different actors portray the roles that some would say are just as famous as the ship itself? No one seemed to care that Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scott, Sulu, Uhura, even the Tribbles were recast with people who have similar characteristics with the actors who originated them. But J.J. Abrams dared recast the Enterprise with something that had similar characteristics, and the world almost came to an end.

I'm sorry, but you are not going to convince someone who may be new to Star Trek or might be interested in a real Star Trek story to go see a movie where we're supposed to believe technology that hasn't seemed futuristic since 1973 is what we'll have a few hundred years from now. I'm not the first to say this, but my cheap $20 cell phone I got from Alltel has more features when it's turned off than Kirk's communicator did on its best day.

Of course, it's almost impossible for me to say that in a room crowded with diehard Star Trek fans, because I wouldn't come out alive. They would tell me that I should get used to it, because it's the story that really matters, and the rest is just nostalgia. So that's it, eh? It's the story that really matters? Can't that be the same argument Abrams can use in redesigning parts of the Enterprise?

A lot of this comes back to WWGD ... What Would Gene Do? The Great Bird of the Galaxy hasn't been with us for 17 years now, so he can't weigh in on this particular instance. But Gene Roddenberry has done things in the past which shows that while he feels the Enterprise is an important character in his Wagon Train to the Stars, it's a character that is allowed to evolve.

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