x_los | I Love The New Star Trek Like Pie, and other SPOILERS

So it's retcon AU Maaaaaadness, and I don't even care. Every canon reference was as manna from heaven. Kirk's petulant, bitchy Captain's Log note-taking? The inclusion of Riverside, Iowa (ten minutes from my college town--yet, of course I've been to see their mock-up Enterprise in the town square, why do you ask?) as Kirk's point of origin? The cliche 'Kirk macking on green-skinned alien babe'? McCoy? Scotty? Chekov? Sulu? Be still my fucking heart.

Also, the movie included, albeit in a truncated fashion that didn't quite do it justice, Wrath of Khan's Kobayashi Maru Scenario. This is one of my favorite bits, so I'm happy it was around.

People (and by people, I mean the horde of boyfen I just finished disagreeing with in the lobby with the collective conceptual capacity of a sieve) are going to bitch that it's not Staaaaaaaar Trek, wah, because of the zany 'traveled back in time' thing. It got likened in my hearing to 'but it was all a dream!' No. No, because JR did actually get shot, y'all, and in a universe that includes time travel, you automatically have to accommodate 'time travel with far reaching consequences.' And don't we already do this double-think with all our comic book fandoms? It's like different cosmologies in a mythology: Egyptian mythology remains coherent as an over-arching cultural system despite the different origin stories promulgated by different cult centers (each emphasizes the primary importance in the creation of their local patron deities). So too does X-Man canon function despite the wide number of different, conflicting story arcs (Ultimate X-Men, House of M, 1602, original!canon, movie!canon, etc.). It doesn't mean your original series doesn't exist any more than House of M means Rouge and Gambit can finally make love (as sweet and spicy and long simmering as Gambit's gumbo) like it's Antarctica all over again! It's just an AU! GTFO!

Most embarrassing moments:

I hope you like New Doctor Who, b/c they're going to be stealing some plot motifs. And by some, I mean a lot. Guess who's the looooonliest half-human member of a dead race of geniuses? If you ever wanted Academy footage or Time War Destruction of Gallifrey highlights, photoshop in some silver trees to go with that desert, the people in robes and your dust red sky, and there you are.

Also, Spock/Uhura is a great lie. A lie I am going to have to go and read a lot of the K/S slash I poked at as a child en route to my Picard/Q otp to dispel.

...can I just say I miss my Romanesque Romulans? I know we rarely see anyone not affiliated with the military/the militaristic government, but we had some picture of Romulan architecture/culture/dress etc., and so while it's not impossible that their thus-far hegemonic culture could encompass this level of variation, the tattooed dudes are unprecedented, and I missed my proper 'hail Brutus' Romulans?

...I could have done with an Andorian walking by in a crowd scene. Just sayin.'

...at some point I realized I remembered the Enterprise's registration number, and both loved and hated myself. I can do both at once. Like I can believe in AU and Original!Universe at once. JUST SAYING, FANBOYS.

Conclusion: Love it! Loathe it! Don't be the fucking sieve.

Also: Mine is still a trekkie heart, and this franchise has closer emotional associations with me than almost anything else. Despite having moved into a larger world of things I spend more time on now, much of how I think about sci-fi and, well, everything, really, was influenced by countless hours of Trek as a child. I've seen every episode but the new Enterprise run (I refuse it like American!Life on Mars, sorry f-listers who like it, if any there be.). And it's definitely done me right. I could make you a favorite ST:TOS episode list on the spot, and may this weekend, during a nostalgic re-watching.