Thursday, January 3, 2013

BAJL Day 3: Sorry Lucas, It's time to talk Trek

         I have been a fan of Star Wars my whole life, with my fandom only growing as I age. But, my love of "the Trek" is a relatively new phenomenon. How did this happen? Two fandoms that hate eachother and yet here I am standing in the middle dipping my proverbial feet into both.
         Now let's get one thing straight, when I am talking Star Trek I am only talking about Star Trek: The Next Generation. I don't like the original Trek with Shatner. I know that without the original there would be no spin-off series so I am grateful for the original I just don't care for it. I don't watch Deep Space Nine, Voyager, or Enterprise either. I am a niche Trek fan and I like TNG (The Next Generation).
         When I was young my dad would sometimes watch TNG and I never understood it. Where were the lightsabers, blasters, wookies, or ewoks? I often mocked those of the "Trekker" fandom whilst a teenager. Then one fateful night in 2009 I sat and watched a full episode of TNG. I don't remember what happened in the episode but I ended up liking it. Six hours later when my then girlfriend, now wife, got home from work, I was hooked.
          What I love about Trek is that it deals specifically with humanity. In the Star Wars universe there are NO humans. Luke, Han, and Leia are humanoid aliens. Meanwhile, Star Trek focuses on mankinds future achievements. In the Star Trek future humans at are peace with one another, there is no war, no racism, no discrimination. Humankind has almost reached a level of perfection. This is a completely different realm of science fiction. What can humanity achieve? The possibilities are limitless and TNG really attempts to  explore those possibilities.
           Through my Netflix instant streaming I have begun to watch the entire TNG series and with every episode I am becoming more of a "Trekker". Capt. Jean-Luc Picard just has an aura about him that I really admire. He always looks for ways to solve a problem without resorting to violence and I think that is a really hopefull vision for the future. Where we can solve our problems through diplomacy instead of war.
             Star Wars will always dominate more of my life as I loved it first but there is plenty of room for me to geek out on Trek too.

3 comments:

  1. Captain Picard notifies me when I receive a text message. Excuse my dated slang, but he is totally the BOMB!

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  2. When I get an e mail warf notifies me "Captain, Incoming Message"

    ReplyDelete