Happy 50th birthday Star Trek. You might be the younger sibling in this house of Who… but we do our best not to play favourites and so here is a blog post just for you.
Although I didn’t get into Star Trek until I was a teen… that does still mean I’ve been a Trekkie for *cough* twenty plus years now.
Yes I cut my teeth on The Next Generation – you can blame Data and Wesley for that – but I soon decided I needed to go to the source and see where it all came from. I still own all the TIME LIFE Star Trek Original series videos I simply begged my parents to buy for me… watched pretty much all of them too. I don’t actually OWN a video player these days, and can’t see myself getting another one any time soon… but I still own those videos. I simply do not have the heart to bin them… though I do doubt any of them are even playable anymore as they did live in the tropics for quite some years and all Who videos I tried to watch from back then well… snapped. Humidity seems to fuse them all together. That is, when the bugs aren’t turning them into nests.
Gosh I love DVDs.
But anyhow, yes I am a Trekkie! Surprise! I used to also be a mad keen Star Wars fan, but when you tinker with perfection for too long its arse tends to fall off… and that is now my opinion of that particular… franchise.
Blake 7, Goodies, Mel Brooks, Monty Python, old and new Who… What can I say? My mind was moulded by some of the best. And most of them are timeless and can never age. Except The Next Generation…. Yeah, that got old real quick and is now one of the only Trek I can’t watch without cringing. Sorry Wes and Data. Still love you loads. 😉
And that is hard now that I am passing these sage tomes of visual wisdom onto my next generation… as do I allow them to be tainted by TNG? Middle Horde is my main partner in crime for all things sci-fi and has been my constant companion here 5pm on a week night where they’ve been showing Voyager. That was until yesterday, where to celebrate Star Trek, they started showing the Original Series from the first episode (not the pilot mind you, but from Where no Man has gone before). Middle Horde loved it… kept going on about all the simply amazing and so spacey and realistic special effects, far better than all the modern CGI stuff. Me… I sat there looking at the 50 year old special effects with my best pout on and wanting my 20 year old special effects back as Voyager hadn’t even made it home yet before they ripped it off the screen to do this. DELAYED SPOILER: Yeah, they make it home… did so 20 years or so ago now. Ooops.
I am not one known to enjoy change to my routine but, as Seven often says: “I will adapt.” There’s only, what? 79 episodes of the Original Series right? Then we might get back to Voyager. Hopefully? Let’s not run through them all and do Next Gen next. Deep Space Nine I can handle (hellloooo Julian!) but not even watching Wes grow up without me being the same age at the time can make me want to sit through Next Gen again. Sorry Jean Luc, love you loads too.
All the same, happy birthday Star Trek! Doctor Who might be my heart and soul – and by introducing Middle Horde to it first she is easier able to adapt to the concept of Original Series vs Enterprise (not that she’s seen it yet). We will deal with the reboots of Trek and her later… she’s not even cut her teeth on the original movies yet. And, yeah, we might just skip the motion picture and go right on in with Khan. Sorry, but true Trekkies know why.
Let us all take a moment to look back and realise exactly how much a love of Trek has created the technology we see today. I use my PADD and communicators all the time. Sadly I can’t talk into my mouse and have my computer know what I’m saying… but there is software that allows me to talk via a dragon. 😉 The blue whales are still safe (I have a model one on my writing desk to prove it), we have tribbles rather than dust bunnies under the couch and I still even own (not so much wear anymore) my Bajoran ear ring. I watched the shows, played the games, wore the t-shirts (still own them and a few other things), and even cut my teeth in writing with an online Trek fan group. My sarcasm needed a home even back then and so if anyone out there knows and remembers Counsellor Lasha Palpatine (you can take a girl away from Star Wars… and all that), or her lovable sidekick Daffyd, Kavin Tamlor or even the Bagheerena twins on Star Base Omega – yup… I’m still writing! I just went old school. 😉
You have been a part of my existence and imagination for over half my life. You have shaped the world around me in ways no other TV show has and I thank you for helping my real life technology get its act together and be as high tech as my standards expected it to be as a child. Reading about Vulcan’s in Homer’s Odyssey and Jem-Hadar (jamadar) and ferengi in Conan Doyle’s work as a teen has always made me smile as they may be older and talking about different things, but the cross over is still funny. 😉
To all those who have been a part of Star Trek from the beginning (helped create it and first fans alike) to those keeping it alive today – I Vulcan salute you.
And, as I do like this play on words…
Live long and prosper, resistance is futile. ❤
Until next time,
Janis.
My blue whale… and other clutter.
Janis Hill 