Word: kirks
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...giggly irresponsibility. Captain Picard, meanwhile, must overcome the siren-like lure of the Nexus, a timeless zone of pure joy that is being sought by the villainous Dr. Soran (Malcolm McDowell). The Nexus is a personalized fantasyland, where Picard experiences the idyllic home life he never had. Captain Kirk is there too, going through his own homey fantasy, but both must reject the Nexus and return to the real world to help defeat Soran. Responsibility, caring for others, recognizing your mortality -- these things too are part of being human...
...have a myth, like the Greeks had. We don't have any. So I think people look to Star Trek to set up a leader and a hearty band of followers. It's Greek classical storytelling." Not that the stars buy all the highfalutin analyses of their work. Kirk has been described as a classic Kennedyesque cold warrior. "That's too esoteric for me," says Shatner. "All I wanted to do was come up with a good character. I always played Kirk close to myself, mostly because of fatigue...
Shatner wouldn't have played Kirk at all if the original pilot for the series had pleased NBC. The show, which Roddenberry produced in 1964, starred Jeffrey Hunter as the captain. But NBC wanted changes, and by the time a new pilot was done, Hunter had dropped out. One actor who remained from the first pilot was Nimoy as Mr. Spock -- though only after Roddenberry persuaded NBC not to drop the character. The network had other alarming suggestions: at one point, Roddenberry recalled, NBC executives suggested that Spock smoke a space cigarette, to please a tobacco-company sponsor...
...Nimoy declined a role after he saw how small his part would be. "I told them," he says, "'The lines that you've written to be spoken by somebody named Spock can be easily distributed to any of the other characters on the screen."' Which is what happened: Captain Kirk appears with two lesser members of the old crew: chief engineer "Scotty" (James Doohan) and Ensign Chekov (Walter Koenig). Several members of the Next Generation cast, meanwhile, were less than thrilled with their relatively small amount of screen time. Says LeVar Burton, who plays Geordi: "Hopefully, if we do another...
Then there was the film's controversial ending. As originally shot, Captain Kirk was killed by a phaser in the back. But test audiences were reportedly dissatisfied, and the scene was reshot just weeks before the film opened. Kirk now has a more action-packed, though considerably lower-tech demise; Trek fans are already grumbling...