J.J. Abrams on Star Trek Set
I love Rocky. I love Rambo. I love Lethal Weapon. And guess what, I enjoyed aaaalllll of their sequels. Has this revelation lowered my approval ratings to Barack Obama levels? Let’s hope not. Wait, not hope. I try not to use that word anymore.
Basically I’m a sucker for a sequel. I like movie adaptations of television shows. Who else is excited about the A-Team movie? What I don’t like are reboots and remakes.
For me the worst movie of last year was Star Trek. The world glorified this second coming of James T. Kirk as if Chris Pine were Jesus Christ himself. I’ll give J.J. My-TV-Shows-Start-Off-Good-And-Turn-To-Shit-By-Season-3 Abrams credit for making a film with amazing visuals. The movie was fun and would have been even better if had he respected Gene Roddenberry instead of taking his characters and raped them. That’s right, I said rape. I felt violated after I left the theater. I can only imagine how the characters felt.
I grew up on Star Trek. As a child the one show my family watched together was Star Trek: The Next Generation. That is a huge achievement for a family. The show started when I was seven and ended when I was fourteen. My sister was two years older. Good luck finding a show today that both parents, a fourteen-year-old boy, and a sixteen-year-old girl will sit down together and watch week after week.
We loved the show. Not to mention the Star Trek movies with the original characters. I had to scrounge to watch the original series but I watched it. It was such an important show and then J.J. Abrams raped it and took what he wanted and left it’s battered body for dead on the floor.
Hollywood is calling J.J. Abrams rape of Star Trek a reboot which means he basically restarted it so that he could millions and millions of dollars without actually having to struggle with doing anything original. More recently I read that the Spiderman franchise is going to receive a “reboot.” Guess what else is getting a reboot: The Crow. The film that took Brandon Lees life. I wonder who’s going to rape his memory. I guess I should clarify my distaste for reboots. I don’t mind new stories as long as they don’t mess with the core of a character.
Star Trek changed everything but Casino Royale remained close to the James Bond character that Ian Fleming created in the original Casino Royale novel.
Remember the Will Smith movie Wild, Wild West? If you don’t I won’t hold it against you. In fact I’m envious because that damn movie is burned into my brain. I’m afraid I’ll never be able to free myself from it.
In that movie Will Smith plays the role of James West, which was first played by Robert Conrad in the 1960s television show. What is the difference between these two actors? Well Smith is black and Conrad is white. My problem isn’t that West becomes black in the film but rather that in the 1999 film the character became a freed slave. That changes the character drastically. Please don’t think that I’m racist. I totally voted for Obama. And I sat next to a guy this morning on the bus that was definitely South American or Cuban, but he surely wasn’t white. So I’m obviously very tolerant.
What about Starsky & Hutch? That was a serious television show. A bit campy but nothing like the movie from 2004. So what is the point of changing a character that someone slaved night after night creating?
If anyone out there has ever written an original piece of work you should understand how painful this is. Imagine if you made a character and someone came up to you and said, “I love your Mr. Woobley-Doo. I think he is so adorable. He’s funny and just makes me feel good inside. What do you think about making him a child rapist that eats his victims? I think an audience would be more drawn to a character like that.”
It would make me cry. I’m not naïve enough to think that people actually care about making good movies anymore. I know no one cares. I also know that the general movie watching public doesn’t care if a movie is good. They’ll see any piece of crap movie out there. Hell, I see everything, good or bad. The only thing I ask is that Hollywood stop rebooting and remaking great films. Stop screwing up great characters. Show some respect.
Grow some balls and take a chance on something original!
How do all of you feel about the Reboot Revolution? And did you like Star Trek? (This is a safe place. You can say it was shit. I won’t hurt you.)
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