Thursday, December 19, 2024

Star Trek: Lower Decks Season Finale Out Now, Ready Room Cancelled

Just a reminder that the final episode of Star Trek: Lower Decks is now available on Paramount+. Now that the season and the series is concluded, good time to binge with the holidays coming up.

On a related note, the Star Trek after show with Wil Wheaton called The Ready Room has been cancelled with its final episode coming out today for a look back at Lower Decks. The cancellation is likely part of continued budget cuts going on at Paramount as part of the 2025 merger with Skydance.

Personal note, do think it was a mistake to cancel Lower Decks with the budget savings not worth the potential long term value being given up.

Star Trek II Joins National Film Registry

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan has been named to the National Film Registry along with 24 other films. The film registry is a preservation effort by The Library of Congress to preserve films based on "due to their cultural, historic or aesthetic importance." Other films added this year include Beverly Hills Cop, No Country for Old Men, Dirty Dancing and more. Full details on the films chosen, the selection process and more can be found at the official announcement.

TCM film historian Jacqueline Stewart said “The National Film Registry now includes 900 titles, and what's remarkable to me is that every year when the board talks about films and their significance, we find new titles to consider. The wealth of American film history is sometimes rather overwhelming, and people often wonder: how do you recommend this film or that film? It's through a lot of research, conversation and discussion, and it's through a commitment to showing the true diversity of filmmaking. I'm thrilled that we recognize student films and independent films, animation, documentary and experimental works, as well as feature length narrative drama, comedy, horror and science fiction on the registry this year.”

Star Trek II writer and director Nicholas Meyer made a statement on Bluesky about his film joining the registry, saying "I am greatly surprised and gratified by this honor, but I feel bound to say in the same breath that Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan stands on the shoulders of many who contributed to the film as well as those who have gone before. Alas, they are not here to take their well-deserved bows. We must pay tribute to Gene Roddenberry, Gene Coon, Harve Bennett, Jack Sowards, Leonard Nimoy, Ricardo Montalban, DeForest Kelley, Nichelle Nichols, Kirstie Alley, James Doohan, Merritt Butrick, Bibi Besch, Paul Winfield, Joe Jennings, Gayne Rescher, Bill Dornisch, Mike Minor & a host of others. In their name and on behalf of current and future Star Trek creators, and on behalf of Star Trek itself and its message of optimism, I thank the Library of Congress for this lovely accolade."

Sunday, December 8, 2024

Official Trailer for Star Trek: Section 31 Movie

Here is the first trailer for Star Trek: Section 31 that will premiere on Paramount+ on January 24. The movie focuses on Academy Award winner Michelle Yeoh's Emperor Philippa Georgiou from Star Trek: Discovery as she performs a mission for the organization.

Wednesday, November 20, 2024

Unification Short Film With Kirk and Spock

In celebration of the 30th anniversary of Star Trek: Generations (release November 18, 1994), here is the latest video in the 765874 series of short films from the Roddenberry Archive. This video, called Unification and mostly silent, has Kirk returns so he can say good-bye to Spock. This was produced with full cooperation of William Shatner and the Nimoy family as production used body doubles for Kirk (Sam Witwer) and Spock (Lawrence Selleck) combined with VFX to pull off the aging process of the characters. You can learn more about making the short film at TrekMovie.

The four short films are connected so worth checking them out: 

Saturday, November 9, 2024

R.I.P. Tony Todd 1954-2024

Actor Tony Todd died on November 6, 2024 at the age of 69. The news was revealed by his wife, Fatima, who said he died at home after a long illness. If you are an entertainment fan of any kind, chances are will recognize the name, the face or his voice.

For Star Trek fans, he was Kurn in Star Trek: The Next Generation and Deep Space Nine. He also played Alpha Hirogen in Star Trek: Voyager. For horror fans, may recognize him as the star of Candyman franchise or appearances in Final Destination movies among many horror movies he was in. For TV fans, he was the voice of Zoom in The Flash, was on Law & Order, Homicide: Life on the Streets and many more. 

For movies, he was in Platoon, Lean on Me, Colors, Night of the Living Dead remake, and again many more. For video games, he voice Venom in Spider-Man 2, and voiced characters in Half-Live, Call of Duty and yep more. Animation he was the go-to voice for Darkseid in various DC animated movies among his many voice roles. Seeing the theme? He was basically everywhere in TV, movies, video games and animation with over 200 acting credits.

“You gotta have audience sympathy for the character in some way or another,” Todd told Deadline in a 2022 interview. “There’s gotta be something attractive about the character that makes people want to root for them but at the same time feel repulsed by the idea. And for me personally, for every film that I do, I create a backstory for all my tortured people and my heroes alike.” 

New Line Cinema summarized it best saying "The industry has lost a legend. We have lost a cherished friend. Rest in peace, Tony."