Author: Alan Dean Foster
Yeah, yeah, yeah....I know this isn't a movie review.....but a book review. I will get to it! Honest!
My husband is a gamer nerd. And after 15 years of marriage, my nerdiness has increased exponentially under his tutelage. I love to read, and I enjoy Star Trek. As a surprise, he bought me 40 used Star Trek paperbacks at a gaming convention. He was away for the weekend and missed me, so he brought he home books. It was a perfect gift for a bibliophile such as myself. Sadly, though I love books, I have lots of adulting to do, so I have way more books than time to read them. I hadn't' really thought about my large collection of Star Trek books until I discovered several more at a local thriftshop this week for 25 cents each. I stood in front of the shelves checking to see which ones I already had (thanks to my taking the time to list all of my books on Goodreads) and filling my cart with more nerdery. As I added books to my cart, I realized that the Star Trek series would be a great start to my quest to pare down my TBR in 2018! I decided to jump right into book #1.....the novelization of the first Star Trek movie....Star Trek: The Motion Picture.
I always thought the name of the movie was a bit silly. But I guess they wanted to make it obvious that the former television series was moving to the big screen. But stating the obvious as a movie title is a bit lackluster. They could have called it Star Trek: Return to the Enterprise. Almost anything but just The Motion Picture. Bleck.
The basics: James T. Kirk returns to captain the Enterprise because a massive energy cloud is heading straight for Earth. It has destroyed several Klingon ships and a Space Station with an energy weapon of some unknown type. The Enterprise has had an 18-month long refit,and is totally updated, but her repairs aren't all completed. Because it is the only Starfleet ship within interception distance of the strange cloud bearing down on Earth, the crew has to take the ship out anyway. The ship intercepts the cloud and encounters an alien presence, Veger. When the truth about the origins and purpose of Veger are revealed, the crew will be challenged as never before to save themselves, and Earth.
The novelization is exactly what you would think --- a novelization of the movie script. I actually watched the movie as I read the book (realizing that the version I was watching (On Demand from television) had been clipped here and there for time. They removed scenes with dialogue rather than taking out some of the longer special effects scenes of the interior of the cloud, the Enterprise, etc.....what's up with that?? Why not remove scenes that are just eye candy (outdated eye candy too) and leave the dialogue between characters?) I enjoyed reading the extra description about the emotions of the characters, their inner thoughts and extra information on things going on around them. It is a good novelization, but I did notice one thing that was a bit weird. Gene Roddenberry's
introduction to the book, and in several places in the story, they refer to "new humans.'' This confused me a bit....something about "new humans" being more adaptable to space travel and other differences with non-improved humans. This must have been some early plot point that got dropped from Roddenberry's vision at some point....I don't recall this concept coming up in any other incarnation of the series. There are also a few cringe worthy comments about Kirk's sexuality and relationships in the book as well, especially a footnote about how his friendship with Spock was misunderstood by some as a homosexual relationship. My husband said it was a comment about some early fan fiction that depicted the two men as homosexual lovers. Ummm.....LOL. I very much doubt the horny Captain Kirk who loved women (even green alien ones) would choose his emotionless, overly logical half vulcan science officer to get intimate with. And it would only have been once every 7 years anyway.....as Spock isn't interested except when in Pon Farr. Fan fiction must have been gruesome even back in the 1970s. OK.....back on subject now! I got pulled out of the story several times by weird commentary added to the novelization that seemed out of place, or just bizarre. Why was it necessary to speculate on whether Kirk and Spock ever had sex with each other even if there was fan fiction? And just all the unnecessary footnotes in general. Were those written by Alan Dean Foster, or were those things added by Roddenberry? I found the footnotes to be a distraction, rather than interesting asides.
A lot of Star Trek fans today agree that the first movie was not very good. At the time, the special effects were amazing, the refit of Enterprise was sweet, and the return of the familiar crew was exciting. But re-watching it today, the story line is pretty ridiculous and the special effects dated. It just plods along.....there are long sequences where very little happens. For me, the novelization is pretty much the same......lackluster plot with some strange commentary added. But, it's still worth a read....and it starts the series of books. I had fun reading the book and watching the film at the same time, while trying not to chuckle at the idea of Kirk and Spock having secret rendezvous in the briefing room. :)
Enjoyable start to my goal of reading books off my own shelf! One Star Trek book down......only hundreds to go. ha ha
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