While I'm Thinking About It

I never talked about the redone Star Trek, did I?

Sure, I mentioned it was coming, and sort of implied that I was looking forward to it. Well, I was, and caught the "first" episode. It was "Balance of Terror," the one where the Enterprise and the Romulan ship play a game of submarine-style cat-and-mouse (complete with silent running!). A handful of things stood out for me:

• The CGI starship looks great. Unfortunately, all they did was recreate the original FX shots, nearly warts and all. Why not an external shot of the Enterprise running from the Romulan plasma weapon? Or actually watching the Federation base and the Romulan ship get destroyed, instead of/in addition to watching Kirk and company watch the destruction on the viewscreen? Based on that, I'm now convinced the CBS folks won't bother replacing the Klingon models used in "The Enterprise Incident" with Romulan models and cutting the line about Romulans using Klingon ship designs. I hold out hope we'll get to see the Enterprise and Koloth's ship both orbiting K-7 in "Trouble with Tribbles".
• Speaking of cutting things, the syndication cuts in this episode wiped out all character development for the young couple who nearly got married in the teaser. Granted, it may not be as vital to the plot as Lt. Styles's sudden prejudice against Spock, and yes, things need to be lost to make more room for the commercials, but not getting to watch them interact dims the tragedy of the ending considerably.
• As for the commercials. Well, here in town it's running at 10:00 pm Saturday and Sunday on what used to be the local UPN affiliate, back when there was such a thing as the United Paramont Network. The folks spending money for commercials at that timeslot seem to be hawking products somewhat less legitmate than most of the spam I get.

So, yeah, it's a mixed bag. I like Star Trek well enough (in case you hadn't noticed), and if it were on at a better time, I'd be all over it. Unless it happens to be one of my personal favorite episodes, though (like the one with the Tribbles), I think I can take a pass.