QUOTE (A Chimpanzee & 2 Trainees @ Aug 25 2011, 04:16 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>
From a general perspective, they are much different movies targeted for people who are looking for completely different moviegoing experiences. I think it's only the fact that they seem superficially similar because they both feature interstellar space travel that makes people want to try to compare them.
I don't think there is really even a superficial similarity between them - although I agree that they both fall under the sci-fi umbrella. I agree that they are franchises created for different purposes and probably aimed at different people; Lucas certainly wanted his movies to appeal to as wide an audience as possible and I think he thought hard about how he could make Star Wars appeal to all people - in fact he worked far, far harder at this then many of today's blockbuster producers who seem to concentrate only on one very narrow demographic and increasingly narrow down the appeal of these popcorn CGI fests to the point that they are not just uninteresting to a wider audience, but actually repellent in some cases to movie fans such as myself. I don't think Star Trek was even on Lucas' radar when he created Star Wars; he certainly wasn't interested in creating a work of intellectual weight - just two good hours to be had by all in a movie theatre with a genre that was underepresented at the time and packaged in a completely new way.
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I see the SW movies as simply fantasy adventure geared specifically for the average teenager in its level of storytelling and character sophistication. That may seem like a slam, but I don't mean that negatively. There's nothing wrong with those movies, and nothing wrong with liking them even if you're not a teenager.
I don't think that Star Wars - at least the first three movies - would have garnered their considerable reputation and following if they had have appealed only to teenagers - even if I was a teenager myself when the first movie came out in 1977. They were definately cinematic events that whole families went to together - in fact I recall that it was probably the very last time I went to the cinema with my parents and sister, and we all went because it was the must-see movie event of the year. I would agree that the later films probably were more targeted at the teenage market, but them we have to bear in mind that the teenage movie market had become a going market only after the early eighties and the big summer blockbuster movie season had only really become established after that time with tie-in merchandise being far more prevalent. TBH, I think that's why I find episodes 1-3 a whole lot less satisfying as films - that - and the fact that they tend to be overlong without justifying the extra running time.
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It just... is, and the people looking for more from their storytelling are the ones who are going to walk away disappointed. The problem with the prequels is that they really tried to broaden the appeal beyond teenagers into pre-teen kids. Likely this is done as a business decision to try to extend the merchandising monolith that SW has become. In the process, the storytelling and characters became notably simpler, leading to the criticisms among the original trilogy's fans that the prequels stink in comparison.
Yes, I'll agree that Lucas tried to suck in the pre-teen market as well and a little too hard. When he began what eventually became his sextet of movies, he had far less of a commercial agenda in mind - I think it was more of a labour of love and a desire to make the kind of movie he wanted to see. However, I'll also point up the extended running time of eps 1-3 and say that if the stories and characters became thinnner - or appeared to be so - I think it was mainly down to them being stretched alomst to breaking point over a great deal of extra celluloid footage! Then again, great action sequences help to sell cool toys don't they?
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ST doesn't really have, to me, that same sort of consistent identity that SW had/has. You could argue this as both a strength and a weakness, but the movies in particular are all over the map ... from the old fashioned sci-fi plotline in TMP, to the adventure of TWOK, to the political thriller that is TUC, to the zombie movie that is FC. The series being originally crafted for TV, its core characters are and were always intended to be more malleable to support a variety of different storylines. The appeal of the characters stems from a slowly growing appreciation of them, so that you care about them on a different level than you do SW. That's not to say that people don't care about the characters in SW, but merely that the attraction is different.
Of course the attraction is different which is why most of us would argue that there is room in the world for loving both at the same time! I like you analysis of the evolving appeal of both franchises. I never saw FC as a "zombie movie" but thinking about it you are quite correct that it does follow many conventions of that genre. I think the attempt to try and sway the emphasis of the Trek movies from mystery, war movies, political thriller and whodunnit ect is indeed one of the strengths of this movie franchise, whereas Star Wars emphasis remains constant.
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(Tying both points together, for example, Riker's the only guy who could BOTH single handedly defeat the Borg AND lose the Enterprise to a 30 year old ship with 1/10th the firepower... and significant numbers of fans HATE that the writers can get away with making him look so inept.)
I don't know if it was just Riker that caught wearing the dunce's cap - even Kirk could be made to look pretty inept at times: I cite his ignoring Saavik's appeals to be cautious and raise sheilds during TWOK which leads to the Reliant chewing the Enterprise a new one, and we're supposed to just buy the fact that Kirk's complacency and advancing age (as indicated by his specs and his allergy to Retinax A) are acceptable excuses for his gross negligance in that encounter; that he didn't figure out there was something wrong with a fellow Starfleet vessel being totally incommunicado and he doesn't smell a rat?
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The upshot is, you can get away with being less rigid in what your movies are about. It's also why, I think SW fans find a lot more to like about that franchise as a whole.
Well, to be fair, there's only six movies and some animated stuff to comprehend compared to the vast amount of Trek product pumped out by Paramount! I guess that if there was an equal amount of Star wars to Star Trek then SW would have to have become much more diverse in content, otherwise SW fans would have become very mored with it indeed!
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While they might individually like a ST movie but not the overall franchise.
Don't we call them "casual fans" and sort of look down on them?!
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It makes the whole body of work a little less satisfying to everyone.
Not to this Trekker - it's that diversity around a central theme that I completely appreciate the most - that, and the evolving history of the whole thing.
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What do you really KNOW that you're getting beyond a bunch of guys on a spaceship and some kind of space combat?
I'd argue that with Star Trek at its best that you're getting philosopy, science, and even prophesy, as well as some much-loved characters evolving.
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You might be able to compare the more adventure themed ST movies to SW, but even then, I'm not sure how you compare the thematic undertones of TWOK to ANH ... I suppose that Khan can be compared slightly to Darth Vader in some respects, or Trek XI's Kirk to Luke Skywalker, but in terms of the movies and not just the characters, I don't see how it makes sense.
I would think it fruitless to even try to draw such comparisons between the components in each franchise - and coming from me that says a lot!
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In the end, let's not forget to be grateful to SW even if you don't like it... without it, we probably wouldn't even have a movie franchise, or at least a much much smaller one.
I don't think there would ever have been a Star Trek movie franchise without the successful Star Wars; even if it had have occurred to Paramount to ressurect Star Trek before Lucas' 1977 success, it would have been on TV and not on the big screen, but Lucas showed there was enormous appetite for space adventure on the big screen.
