Star Trek: Of Gods and Men

I'm surprised that the premise behind this thing never occurred to the producers of any recent Star Trek series. Nevertheless, I'm pleased to see actors from The Original Series, The Movies, Deep Space 9, Voyager, and Enterprise.

I am also pleased to see William Wellman, Jr. take over the character created by Robert Walker, Jr in the Original Series Episode "Charley X" Although the acting is kind of wooden, the story holds up to any DC Fontana standards, although elements of the story are heavily borrowed from episodes of The Original Series and Star Trek: Generations.

Scotty is mentioned as being "Missing" - Which is in continuity with the Next Generation episode "Relics" where Scotty is rescued from a Dyson Sphere. Spock is mentioned as if he is readily available - A nice trick in case Leonard Nimoy decides to make any cameos in parts II or III of this little production.

This story uses elements from the original series stories "Charlie X," "Mirror, Mirror" and "The City on the Edge of Forever" - Including a clever reproduction of the Guardian of Forever.

The set pieces in this thing all look great, but where this fan film staggers is that the special effects all look like Effects from Pre-Windows computer games- The Enterprise "M" starts and stops in the establishing shots of "Synchronous Orbit" - As if the rendering had defects in it.

This is unforgivable since Star Wars episode III used store-bought A.M.D. Opteron computers to do some of post production, and that work was done in some living room right at Skywalker Ranch. So I will accept no excuses about the special effects and CGI shots, I have seen much better work from people who have much less. These are incredibly lousy shots. The computer models are alright, but the movement and rendering is just horrible- I am hoping that the project gains a technician that can re-create the vomitably horrendous outer space and effects shots- And while they are at it, they can work on the colour palette and make it more consistent. Vulcan looks like any East LA Backyard!

Finally, as far as continuity, I accept most of the story like I would accept any Next Generation story, except for the Guardian of Forever would have kept the three principals on the planet instead of ejecting them into the alternate universe.

But even with this huge continuity flaw, the story moves fine, and I can't wait to see the next II episodes.

I like this film a lot more than "The New Voyages" - Which have hardly any redeeming value beyond the costumes and sets that were recreated with great detail: Making Trek is much more than how good the set looks or how well the costumes fit the principals... The trick of Trek is to make the viewer BELIEVE in this future. I believe this story, whereas "The New Voyages" were only good for a belly laugh.

This is a fantastic story. Yes the production is a bit rough and nothing like the Paramount standard but all the veteran actors manage to pull off a reasonably good performance. Walter Koenig also turns to his Bester character from Babylon 5 to give depth to the alternate Pavel Chekov. It's absolutely amazing how you're actually drawn into the story within 10 minutes and you begin to forgive the low budget just for the sake of burning curiosity to find out how the story progresses and when it gets to the end, you're left with a feeling of satisfaction and the hope that it will get remade like the Sanctuary series has been. It might have been a good idea to at least have gone to the Babylon 5 production team to polish off the CGI since they were good at low budget production. There's even a kind of blooper reel at the end credits that are extremely amusing.

It was interesting that they were able to pull so many of the old bit characters back into the story and in many cases with the original actors. The story was basically stitched together from loose ends lying around and the old alternate reality gambit.

The dialogue is tongue-in-cheek much of the time and the directing dragged noticeably in a few places. The acting ranges from very good to forced and pain inducing.

Despite the many flaws, it compares favourably with a lot of the stuff that has been put out by the full budget Paramount crew (which says something about the inconsistent efforts by Paramount). I am sure this crowd of amateurs had fun making it and it is clear they really want to make a good product that captures the feeling of the original series. All power to them. too bad that nothing that is done now can recover the lost opportunity when the original series was cancelled.

Very good idea and it does move along but at a lesser pace than i would like. The direction shows the smaller budget as does the special effects. But it begs to be asked why it took so long and why did Tim Russ let the actors be so boring for the most part. But again great concept and just a tad shy of what it could be in this reunion made for video. definitely a Trekky flick But with a huge Star Wars influence. The special effects takes me back to the first trek movie but without the gloss. Again it shows the low budget. But the rawness does capture the feel. Seeing the actor who played Jake Sisko was nice. As another put it where is Sulu? it would have been nice to see him there. I look forward to seeing the next part and how they can repair the time space continuim that gets destroyed at the beginning

When you get right down to it, Star Trek is about characters. Not CGI. This production offers downright primitive FX, but the characterizations are riveting. Walter Koenig gives a devastating performance -- his best ever -- that actually made me irate when I considered how his immense talent was squandered for so long in corporate Trek. Likewise with Garrett Wang. In Voyager, his Harry Kim was, like many corporate Star Trek characters, bland and generally uninteresting. (That's why alternate time line/universe Trek stories are always superior.) Nichelle Nichols' performance here outshines anything she's done in any of the TOS feature films. Alan Ruck as Harriman oscillates between menacing and hysterical. And JG Hertzler as Koval sets a new standard for menacing Klingons. Chase Masterson (call me!) as the Orion slave girl continues to be the hottest flame in the Star Trek universe. It was great to see Lawrence Montaigne reprise the role of the Vulcan Stonn, and Gary Graham rounds out a truly professional acting ensemble. I'd rather watch cheap productions like this one -- with twisty plots and interesting, passionate characters -- over the slick, simplistic, corporate dreck. Let's see if the upcoming Star Trek prequel -- with its $150 MILLION budget -- can deliver this kind of intense, emotionally engaging adventure. I doubt it.

**UPDATE** OK. I enjoyed Star Trek (2009). It was slick, fast, and fun...and it had two great Spock performances. But I also found the story strained (lacking a coherent plot-line) and derivative (in a bad way). It echoed (strangely) the abysmal Star Trek: Nemesis with its monstrous death-ship and Romulan bad-a$$ baldy. (Maybe in the next film the young Kirk and Spock will go back in time and save some whales.) So, I'd give the big budget flick a 7.9 on its flash and on the strength of Zachary Quinto's performance, but the movie as a whole doesn't hold up well under multiple viewings. I still enjoyed Of Gods and Men more.