Star Trekking for January 5, 2021
Boldly going into the new year
Welcome to Star Trekking, my weekly attempt to share points of interest and random intersections in the final frontier.
The ongoing thesis of this newsletter is that, whether you’re actively looking for it or not, Star Trek is everywhere.
These are their stories.
[ching ching]
Over these past two weeks of staycation, my wife and I spent too much time watching Law and Order Criminal Intent. I love love love Vincent D’Onofrio as Detective Bobby Goren. One of my favorite Twitter moments was when I was able to get D’Onofrio to do a virtual “lean” at me.
Pretty much every actor in North America has appeared in some incarnation or other of the Law and Order universe, so it’s been no surprise to see Brent Spiner and Whoopi Goldberg and Colm Meaney and baby Anton Yelchin and many other Trek adjacent actors show up during our binge.
So I initially greeted the guest appearance of Borg Queen Alice Krige with little more than a happy smile of recognition.
But then came an interrogation scene.
Granted, this scene did not involve my beloved Detective Goren. Starting in season five, Goren alternated episodes with Detective Mike Logan, played by Chris Noth. The first time I watched this series, ten or more years ago, I mostly skipped the Logan episodes. He simply wasn’t Goren. But this time I’m watching all the episodes, even the Logan ones, and my diligence was rewarded.
For during one interrogation, a defendant’s lawyer interrupted with this choice quote: “Enough with the Vulcan mind meld.”
And that makes me wonder, would the results of a mind meld be admissible in court? I mean we all know Vulcans don’t lie (though they certainly exaggerate).
I’m sure there’s a Memory Alpha article that could answer that question. Meanwhile, maybe the question can be explored in this upcoming series.
As a fan of ST—TMP and its accompanying fonts, I really enjoyed this.
And speaking of alternate openings…
“Pike Series”
Archer’s Theme instead of THAT song.
Alternate TNG theme (glad they chose Jerry instead).
Alternate Wrath of Khan main titles.
Adam Nimoy’s homemade opening titles.
A different approach to the original main titles.
Dallas style.
Galactica style.
Inner Light meets Picard main titles.
Star Trek as A-Team.
And finally an actual alternate title sequence, from the “second pilot” version of Where No Man Has Gone Before.
Time for some art! These are from Dave Rothstein and they are delightful.
I have captioned this first one “NO EAT I.”
Here is Riker Makes Breakfast.
The final frontier.
Many more images (incorporating Stars both Trek and Wars) at Dave’s website.
The year in review.
A toast to the year ahead.
Peace and long life to you all, my friends.
DIRECTIVES
I quite enjoyed Adam Nimoy’s book about life in his father’s orbit.
This week I read Mr. Spock’s Little Book of Mindfulness. Full review coming on TrekMovie soon. Capsule summery: fun, entertaining, and might even help you survive a little better in our highly illogical world.
How did I miss that Brent Spiner released an album in 2008? I mean I remember Ol Yellow Eyes is Back from the olden times, but I missed this new one completely.
New Trek science series premieres on YouTube this Sunday. Fascinating.
That’s all for this week. Thank you for reading.
Please let me know what random Trek references you come across during your week. I’d love to share them in future issues.
Grok you later.
LLAP,