To Boldly Go!
OK, I am one of those rare cats who loves both Star Wars and Star Trek. In 1968, my Halloween Star Fleet uniform became my pajamas for the rest of first grade. I first went to Star Wars in 1977 because I had been jonesing for a space opera since they cancelled Star Trek. I watched almost every episode of The Next Generation on the night it came out. Since Return of the Jedi, I’ve seen every Star Wars movie on opening day, usually at the midnight showing. I’ve seen every Star Trek movie several times (ESPECIALLY the bad ones) and I intend to see this next one several times, as well.
Set Phasers to PHABULOUS!
And now, from the franchise that brought you the first interracial kiss on TV, with the release of Star Trek Beyond in two weeks, we FINALLY have a gay character!
In an apparent homage to George Takei, who first came out as gay in 2005, Lieutenant Hikaru Sulu, chief helmsman aboard the Enterprise, is revealed to be raising a daughter with his same-sex partner.
Kudos to director Justin Lin and writer/Mr Scott Simon Pegg (who also had a cameo in the latest Star Wars movie!) for this classy, classy move.
Way to Boldly Go where no Star Trek has gone before!
My favorite episodes are the ones featuring Whoopi Goldberg. Her combination of humor and social science fiction are the best.
Interracial kissing, homosexuality … all the other many things that have been normal/happening throughout history gaining acceptance through television and movies is sad in a way. Sad in that religion has been used as a tool to create a false narrative of “bad/sin” and that fictional examples of reality are needed to create acceptance and combat that ignorance.
1Yeah… it’s nice but that’s Stardate 2400 or something, right? Meanwhile, back in Stardate 2016 things are a bit different. Would be great to go back to the future.
2You just made my day!
3This is wonderful news! My hat (all ten gallons of it) is off to the series producers for this, and for their courage in doing so. And I think the way they are doing it is perfect – by simply carrying on as normal and not making a big deal about it. If the right-wingers don’t like it, they can just go off and live in their own alternate universe…
4Where I live I have this to look forward to!
5http://heroesandiconstv.com/allstartrek/
I am also a Star Trek fan from the earliest days.
I was a Lt in The USAF stationed at Grand Forks AFB (North Dakota) when Star Trek TV was first aired.
There was no cable and the closest T V station was at Fargo, North Dakota. Reception was snowy!
6Well. I have been to Riverside, iowa and have seen the gravesight of Captain James T Kirk of the Enterprise. He hasn’t been born in Riverside, yet, but he will be.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1H4SH3Zx6xg
7I’ve always been a huge fan of both, and I’m glad Sulu gets to be who he really is. Hats off to the director.
8Gosh, it’s kind of too bad that they buried him before he was born.
I hate it when that happens.
9While this is amazingly great news I look forward to the day when it is not news.
10Live long and prosper Primo. Live long and prosper.
11Nice to see that honky-tonk bars and pool tables will still be important in another 200 years.
12I look forward to a Star Trek film which will include a sub-plot in which a total overweight nerd gets to lay with the most beautiful woman on board.
13Billiards (cue sports, pool) has been around for 5-600 years already; another 200 should see it still going strong if the human race survives. Public places to drink, and music made in them, are even older. So I think honky-tonk bars (or some equivalent) and pool tables will outlast me and generations after me.
14Oh, yeah…both a Star Trek and Star Wars fan, though we’ve been w/o a TV off and on, or without access to some channels that carried the later Trek iterations. (Or they showed up near midnight when I couldn’t stay awake, having an early-rising kid and a boatload of work to do.)
15Hey Primo, looking back and trying to put my finger on my favorite Next Generation episodes, two stuck out. Part 1 of the 2 episode cliffhanger where Picard is taken by the Borg and Riker gives the order to attack and destroy the ship. And the one where an admiral wants to do some destructive examination on Data (i.e. dissecting his positronic brain), and Riker is forced (by duty) to act as the prosecutor and to demonstrate Data’s status as machine instead of person switches him off. What makes that one so great is the final conversation where Data thanked him. Both episodes, to me at least, are the pinnacle of sci-fi. Books or film. Human stories set in situations different than our own.
16This is good news and a very good way to do it. Let the right wingnuts obsess over sex. LBTG folks don’t need to.
17George wrote and directed and produced a play in which he starred. I think it even hit Broadway. I am very aware of the constant evidence of William Shatner in various TV shows and ads. He has been the most persistent survivor of the show he “captained” and it is good to see George get chance at resurrection.
18Well, that took long enough. So glad that one of my favorite shows is finally, finally bringing yet another forgotten/ignored group of people in from the cold.
To PP:
Yeah, the ep when Data almost got dismantled is one of my all time favorites, too.
I hadn’t been watching the show up to that point. I really didn’t like the first edition. Called it, “Cowboys in space.” Yes, it was all the country was ready for at the time, but I just never liked it.
So I assumed I wouldn’t like ST/NG either. Then, a friend saw the Data Disassembly ep and told me to watch it [it was shown twice per week so I was able to catch it right away.] And I was hooked.
19Star Trek has been, and is, a very important part of my life. From trying to understand the meaning behind the original episodes (and waiting till next week) to getting a Trekker wife. My favorite Captain is Benjamin Sisco, a man dedicated to those he loves/cares for, even unto brutal retribution. Even unto forgiveness…
George Takei has said this decision was “unfortunate” because it strays from Rodenberry’s script, and I can respect that. BUT, we have been waiting for an openly Gay character to root for since (subliminally) the beginning. The proof of Love is Love is Love is Love taking us away from the bizarre standards of the past into our growth as a species in the future. Maybe we just want to ditch the fear when we go to the movies. Or at least some of them.
20PP – I did like that episode, too, with the poignant reminder of Tasha Yar.
I think my favorite part of the series, if I had to pick one thing, was the Worf story arc accepting discommendation for the good of the Empire, only to later win back his family honor and screw the House of Duras. Picard was especially badass during these times.
I could have done without Alexander, though.
21epo – I do like the combination museum/übertacky gift shop. And finding out that Kirk is a Pisces/Aries cusp is enlightening.
But that is the suckiest damn song in the galaxy! It made me want to listen to Vogon poetry instead. Or even cuts off Nimoy and Shatner’s albums from the Sixties. Just gut-wrenchingly awful.
22I’m not sure what it says about me, but my favorite episode is Tribbles.
23lunargent- Riverside is in Amish country. That may have something to do with the quality of music.
I mind a leading men’s magazine did a rundown on celebrity albums several years ago and they weren’t real complimentary to Kirk and others who used their fame to score a record deal.
24George in Lee County, don’t look now, but that ‘episode’ is in the RNC platform based on snacilbuper House speakers, their current president candidate and at their official teevee station Fox Not the News with their ‘heroes’ Roger Ailes and Rupert Murdoch.
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