I would like to throw into the pot a couple of things that you’ve made me mull over from reading your post.

I love the principle UK Star Trek poster. Yes it may be bold and abstract, but as a design it plays on the strengths of Star Trek and the UK audience who I believe for the most part have a sophistication and appreciation of styled graphic images, especially film posters.

I hope that the designers purposely did the homage to ‘79 poster or maybe even better, they came to it naturally, as the Enterprise is one of the iconic forms that tie the franchise together. Quality of the design is a big key to it’s original success in the 60s as well is great writing (for the most part, 3rd series dipped badly – Spock’s Brain, anyone?).

The next designs are okay, but what is it with the third one’s use of the extra set of eyes? It makes Kirk seem a malevolent force rather than just a rebel (if that’s what he is?). Hmm?

It’s interesting what you say about the perception of the less Americanised markets. For all it’s innocuous feel, Trek has always been a blunt instrument in pushing out social (Western/American) memes, like a lot cinema is.

Gene Roddenberry was a utopian and also product of post war optimism, so his Star Trek was of a JFK as Kirk against the Commie Klingons and Fascist Romulans.

Star Trek TNG & the movie franchise continued part of Roddenberry’s course but with a more PC internationalist agenda but got better and a tad more experimental after he died as this freed up a younger generation of writers to add a modern (80s) take.

Star Trek VI – The Undiscovered Country and their very simplistic references to the collapse of the Soviet Union with a Klingon Gorbachev (the great David Warner) dealing with a major disaster, again a thinly disguised Chernobyl. Not a bad film as its still bit fun, even with a geriatric cast.

The other series have highs and lows like a lot of TV until finally we have ‘Enterprise’ in the noughties, which bigs up their theme of 9/11 terrorism and the gung-ho Americanism of bringing the fight to the enemy. The end of Trek or so it seemed.

I haven’t a clue what this Trek will be like, but I’m going to keep an eye on some of your work with team PPC, which I’m sure will have some interesting takes on promoting the franchise, hard to pin down as you said but your definitely giving a lot of thought by this blog.

One last set of words. The Towering Inferno… wow… they don’t make’em like they used to (sic). I loved all those disaster movie posters from when I was young and they held such magic for my imagination as I couldn’t go see them, being to young for a AA cert. Ha!

As always Dan, you’ve supplied a hefty plate of brain food today. Yum!

Best regards,
Derek

I think the destruction of iconic structures relays a feeling of genuine peril and a message that life has changed to an extent that it cannot be changed back. They also convey a sense of grandiosity to a film and make it come across as a great spectacle, not to be missed. I remember the poster for Gorgo (where a rampaging beast tears up London town) is another example. As is the decapitated Statue Of Liberty used in the Escape From New York, which must have enticed a large number of people into the cinema to see what was in fact a pretty low budget (albeit excellent) film.

For me, Star Trek has always been an affirmation of the nobler parts of Western Liberal Democracy. I think Roddenberry believed that its tenets were universal and matters of absolute truth, like the laws of physics. Therefore it was perfectly natural for advanced civilisations to evolve their own forms of Democracy. I think if Star Trek had been conceived today, it wouldn’t have been so ideologically confident.

That new poster is the only thing from the whole campaign that has made me sit up and take notice. But sadly, your posting of The Motion Picture poster now makes me want to watch some real Star Trek. It gets a lot of knocking, but it’s my favourite of the franchise, flawed as it is.

I doubt very much that if anything in the original Star Trek resembled the utter crap I’ve seen in the 90210 trailer that the franchise would have ever made it this far.

South America seems to have hit the nail on the head with their Star Trek: Disaster.

STD being what the new Kirk is all about by the look of his date rapist good looks…