At The Movie House: Happy Birthday Star Trek

This blog is devoted to all things movie related, so today we say happy 44th birthday to the Star Trek TV series and the universe it created. On September 8, 1966 NBC aired the first episode of the original Star Trek TV series. The show would last just three seasons and produce 80 episodes, but it's impact on popular culture continues to this day. The series created a franchise that is worth over $4 billion dollars. There have been eleven feature films, five additional TV series, including an animated version, countless books and oodles of merchandise. Lines such as "Beam me up, Scotty" and "Live long and prosper" have become cultural catch phrases.

Here are the five captains of the Star Trek TV series.
Captain Kirk - Star Trek
Captain Picard - Star Trek: The Next Generation
Captain Janeway - Star Trek: Voyager
Captain Archer - Star Trek: Enterprise
Captain Sisko - Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

An illustration page from the animated TV series that aired
from 1973 to 1974

In 1979 paramount released Star Trek: The Motion Picture, it was a financial success but a critical bomb. Trekkies and non-Trekkies disliked it. A sequel was made in 1982, Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan, with more emphasis on action and less on talk and it was a huge hit. Many fans consider it to be the best of all the Star Trek movies. Star Trek II launched a story telling arc that would result in one of the best film trilogies ever made, with the story concluding in the phenomenally successful Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.

The series was almost derailed after the critical and commercial failure of Star Trek V: The Final Frontier in 1989. This is considered the worst film in the series, directed by Captain Kirk himself, William Shatner. After an extra year's delay, Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country was released and put the series back on track. But the original cast was getting a little long in the tooth, so this would prove to be the final voyage of the full cast of the original Star trek series that had launched twenty five years earlier.

In 1994 a few members of the original crew appeared with members from the new TV series, Star Trek: The Next Generation, in a storyline that melded the two time periods together. It was successful and set the stage for the new crew to appear in a series of feature films.

The best of these was the 1996 film Star Trek: First Contact. It is one of the best films in the entire series. It featured time travel and the relentless and frightening Borg, and told the back story of earth's first contact with extra-terrestrial species. The next generation cast and crew went on to make two more films 1998's Star Trek: Insurrection and 2002 Star Trek: Nemesis. Nemesis was the least financially successful film of the series, and the next generation cast was now in their 15th year of playing these roles, so this film became their swan song.

In 2009 paramount Pictures "rebooted" the franchise by starting all over from the beginning. An entirely new cast was brought in to tell the adventures of the Starship Enterprise and it's five year mission to go where no man has gone before. To provide continuity Leonard Nimoy made his final appearance as Spock.

The movie was schedule for release on December 25, 2008. Paramount looked at the film and was so pleased by it's potential, they moved the date to May 2009 to establish a new summer blockbuster franchise. This gave director J.J. Abrams a few extra months to perfect the special effects. The delay proved to be a smart move for Paramount. The film was a massive box office hit. It won the hearts of skeptical Trekkies and appealed to regular audiences as well.

The journey continues on June 29, 2012 with the release of Star Trek 2 (aka Star Trek 12).

Here is a look back at the poster artwork from the film series.

The original poster from the 1979 film. Notice how it resembles other disaster movie posters of the time.

more graphic colorful poster

The 1982 sequel has a very 80's look.

a second poster still retains the 80's type logo but captures the artistic styling of the 1979 poster.

A teaser poster for the third film features a ghostly image of Spock

1984 poster in the same styling of the posters for the 79 & 82 films.

Teaser poster for 1986 film.

1986 poster references artistic style of earlier works but has a very 80's vibe, including the pastel colorings. Modern day San Francisco is prominently featured.

80's pastels and style are still prominent in this poster from 1989

Like other posters, the teaser for Star Trek 6 did not feature cast members.

For Star Trek 6 the emphasis is on action. The poster is very dynamic.

The 1994 teaser poster for Generations. Like the other teaser posters none of the cast is shown. The graphic design mimics the shape of the Federation logo. At this point numbering the films was dropped.

This poster is almost identical to the teaser. Shatner and Stewart are prominently featured to link the old cast with the new cast.

The teaser poster for Star Trek 8 made it clear, The Borg were coming!

The theatrical poster for First Contact featured Picard, Data and The Borg

The poster Star Trek: Insurrection was the first not to feature any images of the cast.

The poster for Nemesis did not show the Enterprise, which had been featured prominently through out the series. Instead it had Picard, Data and a mystery figure in shadow and smoke.