We’ve all had the argument – which is better, Star Wars or Star Trek (it’s Star Wars, deal with it) but now Captain James T Kirk himself, William Shatner has thrown another angle on the age old argument… and said that, had Star Wars not happened, Star Trek would have died and stayed in the 1960s.
At the 15th annual official Star Trek convention in Las Vegas on Saturday, Shatner dropped the sci-fi bombshell on the unsuspecting crowd and now world:“First of all, Star Wars created Star Trek. You know that?”
Wut? But Star Trek began waaaaaaaay back in 1966 whereas Star Wars didn’t arrive until 1977 so is this some weird time paradox? Well, no.
Shatner meant that Trek had been cancelled in 1969 and Paramount were done with the franchise until, eight years later, George Lucas released Star Wars and Paramount wanted to capitalise on the buzz around it: “At Paramount Studios they were running around bumping into each other: ‘What do we got?! What do we got to equal Star Wars? This is a big thing!”
“There was this thing that we canceled, under another management, it was called Star … Trek? Let’s resurrect that!
“It was Star Wars that thrust Star Trek into the people of Paramount’s consciousness,” Shatner said.
However, while Kirk, sorry Shatner, said Star Wars we responsible for the return of Star Trek on the big and small screen, he was fast to reinforce the fact that Trek was at no point a copy of Lucas’ franchise: “Star Trek at its best tells human stories. It’s philosophical. There’s humanity. There’s a principle involved. And it’s well done. It’s about people,” he said.
“Star Wars was grand, like opera. It was huge with great special effects. It was a marvelously entertaining film, but it wasn’t specifically about people the way those Star Treks were.”
Well, we could argue that until we’re blue in the face but in the meantime we just want to say ‘take that, Star Trek!’.
Don’t worry, we’re kidding… promise.
Source: Mashable
Marc
Marc is a self-confessed nerd. Ever since seeing Star Wars for the first time around 1979 he’s been an unapologetic fan of the Wars and still believes, with Clone Wars and now Underworld, we are yet to see the best Star Wars. He’s a dad of two who now doesn’t have the time (or money) to collect the amount of toys, comics, movies and books he once did, much to the relief of his long-suffering wife. In the real world he’s a graphic designer. He started Following the Nerd because he was tired of searching a million sites every day for all the best news that he loves and decided to create one place where you can go to get the whole lot. Secretly he longs to be sitting in the cockpit of his YT-1300 Corellian Transport ship with his co-pilot Chewie, roaming the universe, waiting for his next big adventure, but feels just at home watching cartoons with his kids….
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