Lit ACKBAR IS BACK - The Lit Forum Social Thread, v2.0

Meh, reminds me of r/explainlikeimjive.

You remember those Star Wars Snowflakes that Coffee showed us a while ago?



I was feeling crafty today.

Did that really necessitate four pieces of tape?

Yes. Yes it did.

BWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA So cute....

Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn became available on DVD yesterday.

Bah, marking time for Dragonborn on PC. And Bioshock Infinite.

The long version?

Yes, the 90 minute version.

I love Christopher Nolan movies as much as the next guy, but this and the poster are a travesty. Starring Benedict Cumberbatch as Raoul Silva starring as Bane. And not ONE shot of space in the whole thing.

Cool. May have to go by Best Buy then.

I know we all had a good laugh about Angry Birds Star Wars and the EU, but as it happens...



...is that the first evidence that Hoth has bodies of ice water?

That is brilliant!

Now we have visual proof of the ill fated attempt by Blizzard 4 and Nevar's group to go a different direction than Veers...

FWIW, I think people forget that Star Trek TOS as well as Star Trek II and III were rather dark. As silly as some of the episodes of the original series looked, they actually dealt with some serious and sometimes dark issues.

I think it works better as this being a new timeline rather than trying to make the existing characters fit into darker storylines such as they did in the last few Next Generation movies.

And I remember people being upset that Jean-Luc Picard wasn't punching out foam headed aliens and shagging green skinned women and preferred TALKING differences out, but to many, THAT became Star Trek.

In some ways...maybe this hews closer to what Star Trek originally was? It might not be the Star Trek we watched as kids, but it'll be someone's Star Trek; not unlike the difference between the OT, the PT, and now the ST...there will be plenty who say this or that one isn't "true" SW.

The new Star Trek trailer is really growing on me. Yes, it's obvious that the marketeers are trying to play it off as Nolan-esque, but if you look at the actual elements in the trailer, you've got some stuff that could be potentially quite awesome.

As for the tone, DS9 is my favorite Trek series, and it gets pretty darn dark at times, so that doesn't worry me too much. What Star Trek has always been about is mature friendship, a "family" of a crew whose relationships and character are tested and proven by what they encounter out in the Great Unknown. In other words, in the best Star Trek, the characters are primary, and whatever sci-fi elements there are exist primarily for the sake of these characters. I think this film has the potential to do that quite well.

Cumberbatch's villain also intrigues me. His comments on family are interesting, and I like the idea of posing him as a kind of dark mirror-image of Kirk. There are overtones of "Heart of Darkness" in the trailer, with Cumberbatch having gone "up the river" and inviting Kirk to follow; and that's an idea that could be very effective in the Star Trek format. With the "family" comments in the Japanese trailer, there's also the potential idea that Cumberbatch's character may have lost his own "family," and is now going to deliberately push Kirk to see how much he's willing to give for his crew, and whether he's willing to sacrifice himself for them; which is also potentially an awesome idea, which goes to the heart of Star Trek's perennial focus on the burdens and responsibilities of command.

As to who he is, at this point, my theory is that he's a genetic Augment created by Starfleet secretly to fight the Klingons, who has gone rogue and wants revenge on those who created him. That's potentially a pretty dark idea, but not too different from the Section 31 plotline on DS9, and could have a lot of power if executed properly.

Essentially, good Trek is defined not by tone, but by content; and that means relationship, which necessarily includes both humor and peril. If this film can pull that off, it will be good Star Trek. Nolan-esque sound-effects in trailers or a dark tone have little significance for me.

Oh, and as for space battles (which I admit the trailer has a significant dearth of: SHAME ON YOU JJ ABRAMS!), there is the shot of the Enterprise rising out of the water and another ship crashing into it. An underwater battle between starships would be incredibly cool.