Amph [NERRRD] Observations, rhetorical questions, comments & 55 Years of Star Trek (General Thread)

Didn't he also go plums deep in seven of nine?

 

worst

 

I am so deeply disappointed by this news that I barely have words for it. It's like the universe is out to have Abrams and Orci systematically destroy everything I enjoy. Because for its 50th anniversary, what Star Trek needs is a guy who tells fans to **** OFF for criticizing his films, who tweets his conspiracy BS the day of the Boston bombings, who thinks Kirk is just like George W. Bush, who writes off Chapel as a completely forgettable fling of Kirk's, who sees Spock as Obama and then says, "Wonderful thing about Obama is that he is living proof that no matter the color of your skin, or where you were born, anyone can grow up to be a puppet of the militaryindustrialpharmaceutical complex."

CAN'T ****IN' WAIT


*gotta star out the whole word

 

First Contact says that the Borg are already well-established in the Delta Quadrant in 2063. So I doubt that V'Ger has anything to do with their creation

 

The only reference I'm aware of connecting V'Ger to the Borg is that ST:LEGACY game that came out years ago. I'd take this explanation with a grain of salt at best...


As far as thing Orci thing goes, IMO it's pretty clear that Paramount is betting on brand appeal alone and is making their decisions based on how the dish looks on the menu rather than those who are in the kitchen preparing it.

 

One of Shatner's books made the connection, but more that V'ger ran into the Borg and they discovered a kindred spirit and sent it home with the technology that surrounded it.

Of course, explicitly non-canon.

 

I just looked up the 'writing team' (Patrick McKay & John D Payne) for Orci's ST3, and they have no other writing credits. Not a damn thing. First time screenwriters and a hack writer/first-time director that is hostile to the fanbase. Somehow I don't sense a miraculous discovery of talent here, ala Nicholas Meyer. JJ's pulled his production team (cinematographer, editor, et al) to work on Ep. 7- so besides the cast, who the hell is on this that knows what they're doing?!

 

Well, at least he got that part right.

And lol I didn't know Orci didn't have directing experience. wtf. Why not just pull a random person out of film school? I'm sure at least 1/3rd of them could put out a better screenplay if nothing else.

 

I wonder if he's going to be either a total prima donna, control freak, jerk director trying to wear daddy's shoes; or is going to be so wound-up with the stress that his best direction is 'faster...more intense' and the real work is done by DP, AD's, & 2nd unit director.

 

Nicholas Meyer was a longtime Paramount loyalist who did many a work-for-hire for the studio, starting with The Love Story Story, and moving on from there primarily utilizing his writing skills, IIRC.

Paramount knew what they had in him and had been with the studio for about 12 years by that point.

Not saying they do or don't know what they have with Bob Orci, but the studio system was a vastly different thing back then and homegrown talent was way more common. I'm hugely pessimistic about this, but I don't think this particular comparison is fair, just based on the way things are run then vs. now.

 

It's too bad he was saying that to insinuate that BS conspiracy "birther" theory that Obama was born outside the US. He said basically the same thing in 2011 but clarified that he meant:

"Seems to me Obama is considered lefty. I insulted him in my post. Even questioning where he was born. So your post is not even internally consistent."
Now, criticizing Obama or his policies is fine but that birther stuff really rubs me the wrong way. I should hope for obvious reasons. I'm really disappointed that this man is directing Trek. He doesn't seem to understand what it's about in the slightest.

 

That's probably why it got brought up in "The Return" which featured the Borg and the connection to V'Ger.

 

Star Trek into Alex Jones's ***.

 

That was cool. Did that come from Paramount? How come they don't do more stuff like that?

 

It's from a video game. It's not canon, for one. For another, it's stupid. I thought that V'Ger merging with that dude was the origin of the Borg, but I was 8 years old at the time. There doesn't need to be a connection.

 

Assumed by whom? And there's at least one other wildly different Borg origin out there in the novels.

I prefer the Borg Queen's "we used to be 100% biological humanoids like any planet of the week and we got a little obsessed with technology" explanation. It's simple and obvious and doesn't beg for elaboration. I don't see why an infant looking for its "parents" should be the creator of the zombie hordes of the anti-Federation on the other side of the galaxy centuries before it was even launched.

 

Re: ST 2.0: 3, Why not Orci? This current incarnation of Star Trek is what it is. Trying to graft big ideas onto it at this point would be like wearing brown shoes with a black tuxedo.

 

Because a 9/11 truther and horrible conspiracy theorist who uses his movies as a platform for his views and claims to be a huge Trekkie despite apparently not understanding the "big ideas" of Trek seem to me to be a colossally poor idea on its face.

Can I be wrong? Sure, I frequently am.

But that's my take. He was responsible for literally everything wrong with Into Darkness except Khan (I believe him when he said he and Lindelof didn't want Khan) -- but magic blood, Alice Eve, rehashing a classic story without emotion or context... that's all him.

 

Don't get me wrong, I'm not defending Orci's views or his talents as a writer, but I think it's probably too late to shift gears at this point, and not many directors (unless they're just hired guns) like to come into an already established franchise--or, in this case, incarnation. So why not dance with the one that brung ya? The first two films made a ton of money, made ST pop-culturally relevant again, and appealed to a lot of people who weren't normally ST fans. From Paramount's perspective, it makes a lot of sense to stick with the formula.

I sort of doubt this particular incarnation will go more than another film or two. I say finish it out, and then by God get to work on a new ST TV series.

 

Because he also has literally no directing experience -- not even a school play, let alone a commercial -- on his resume. Also, the new writers have no experience writing anything in Hollywood (this is both of their first credit).

As I believe Devin Faraci said: this is equivilent of giving a flight attendant the keys to a 747 and having them drive it because they've been around the cockpit so much.

 

I think what it comes down to is, directors weren't exactly lining up for this gig. He also got JJ's blessing. It's a huge gig for any director, let alone a first timer. I'm really curious to see how this all turns out.