Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Star Wars vs Star Trek, or Potential new sci-fi Mashup?



So, as many of you know now, a few months ago, the Disney Company bought the rights to Lucasfilm for a little over $4.05 Billion US. According to several sources, this will give Disney the ownership but not control over the Lucas brands and letting them create what they want…hopefully. And with this purchase, they plan on creating a new trilogy for Star Wars starting with an episode 7 in 2015. 

At first I was a bit scared with this, considering its Disney and all and was afraid that they would cute it up much like many Disney films. Then I was reminded that Buena Vista, a bi-company of Disney, are responsible for making many other films that aren’t exactly up to Disney ratings (P.G. or lower) such as the Kill Bill series, and many of the current Marvel movies , which by the way Disney also bought the rights too as well. Hmm...They certainly are buying their share of the entertainment pie, and then some...aren’t they? 







Now here’s a more recent announcement that was made only a few days ago. J.J. Abrams, director of many films and television shows, including Alias, Cloverfield, and the re-launch of the Star Trek movie franchise, is to direct the upcoming episode 7 of the Star Wars film. Hmmm…to be quite honest I’m not sure if I should feel impressed, excited, intimidated, or worried about this...I mean he already has control over the current Star Trek films, now this? 




Just think about it for a second. For those of you that aren’t aware, ever since the introduction of both Star Trek and Star Wars in society (1960’s and 70’s respectively) , there has been a dormant, but existing animosity of die hard fans of both genres only pitting themselves against each other when the topic of ‘which is better Star Wars or Star Trek?’ thus at times in the past starting heated debates, to full on arguments (and even in a few instances, physical fights). Sadly, this has not changed much in all of that time. This is especially true with the recent surge of “geek culture” in current society.






So, with this in mind, and the fact the Abrams, already being responsible for successfully rebooting the Star Trek franchise (and with the upcoming sequel coming up this summer which I DO plan to see), he now has his hand in Star Wars. Now some think what he did for Star Trek, can be equally successful with Star Wars, and if it was with any other well know sci-fi based director/producer, I would agree. I like many, felt it was time that they brought some fresh talent and ideas to the Star Wars franchise, since it seemed Lucas seems to have fallen off slightly with his ideology of the franchise he created, though for some that’s debatable, but a topic for another time. 






That said, it just seems wrong that he director for this new launch of a new trilogy from where Return of the Jedi left off (long overdue I might add) just happens to be the same person currently doing the Star Trek re-launch. To me that just seems wrong. Why? Because 1.) It’s just too much control for one man to have. Think about it. Star Wars and Star Trek are the two largest and most influential science fiction franchises of both the 20th and 21st centuries. To me it seems too much on the table for that. 2.) Considering that many fans of both do not share likability of the opposing franchise, or at the very least don’t think they should be potentially lumped into one, will greatly fear a potential mash up of sorts of both. Though for some, this would be interesting to see, for many others, well…not so much.





I don’t know…perhaps I might be overreacting on this one. Still I think there could be a potential problem with this. Then again we won’t know for sure until the release of Episode 7 in comparison to the previous films and possibly with now the Star Trek films. And I’m a fan of both. 

Opinions on this?




 

1 comment:

  1. Well, here we are...early reviews overwhelmingly suggest Abrams nailed it.

    ReplyDelete

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