Analysis of Star Trek Television Series - Movie Review Example

Star trek is one of the oldest American entertainment series that has been around now for more than forty years. Star Trek is a unique series since it is in itself a franchise that contains an original version and the animated version. Star trek is one of the most successful series that America has ever had in the twentieth century and continues well into the twenty first century. The Star Trek franchise comprises of about six television series namely The Original Series, The Next Generation, The Animated Series, Voyager, Deep Space Nine and Enterprise. Due to its having developed a long time ago, it can as well be used to reflect the American cultural background. The very first episode of this series was aired on the year nineteen sixty six. The series then ran for two more episodes, each one of them portraying a bunch of daring Americans trying to explore the continent and those places where no man had ever laid foot to before. The series gained a very loyal fan base at the time and as the show came to a close in the year nineteen sixty nine, these fans could not bear it and they pushed for the continuation of the series. This translated into success to one Gene Roddenberry, the founder of the show. Surprisingly, most of the fans were female fans who were thrilled by the show’s three main characters Vulcan, Captain Kirk and McCoy the old doctor. The series’ genre can be classified as a science fiction on one hand but on the other the show can also be termed as a fantasy inclined kind of show. The series has grown over the years and can be said to be universal across all gender due to its amusing characters. The series also has characters such as ‘the Borg’ who is an alien character that’s ruthless and raises emotions every time he appears. As such, the targeted audience for this series can therefore be seen as being the younger generation. Children will find it amusing when a bad character is taken down by the good characters. This guarantees continuity of the series and explains the prolonged time frame that the series has been relevant. The original idea for Gene was to create a series that would portray future scientific possibilities. He used his imagination to create a series that he believed represented some possible future events. This explains the reason why the original name of the series was ‘Wagon Train to the Stars’. This is how the original idea evolved in to the present day success story which almost every American can identify himself with. It was a period where the globe was experiencing numerous transformations and discoveries especially in America. The creativity of the founder can be explained by this phenomenon and the continuity of the series emanates from the firm background of the founding era and the activities that were prevalent at that moment. The present day world seems to be moving towards those events that were forecasted by the very first episodes of the series. The innovations that are currently being worked on today especially in the United States have a close resemblance to those that the creator of star trek had in mind. An example of such innovations includes the project that Google has embarked on to create a voice-controlled personal assistant. The project which is already underway is known as ‘Majel’ has clearly borrowed a leaf from the episodes of star trek. The company is said to have already purchased a voice-recognition software towards this cause. The software will make communication easier and also reduce the tedious nature of tapping computers keyboards. This software will go even a step further and be available to mobile handsets that support android application and also tablets. It has also been reported that some computer experts and geniuses are planning to build the ultimate star trek computer that will make have all those fictious features of the ones in the show This explains the reason why the series is a unique one of its kind since the original idea was not to create functional ideas but to create fictional characters designed to entertain fans and in the process generate cash for the creators. This is also clear since there exists the animated version of the series. This signifies the will of the creators to reach out to the younger generation in terms of entertainment. The series has undergone several overhauls in order to incorporate new thinking into the series. Star Trek crew has also proved to be very innovative. The producers of the eleventh film which premièred in the year two thousand and nine had a unique way of advertising the series. The advert ran as "this is not your fathers Star Trek". This was a very innovative advert since it helped in linking the earlier generation of fans to the new era generation of fans and non fans. Actually their reason for such an advert was to lure some non fans and giving the older generation of fans a reason to check out the new film. There has also been discovered a rare radio program that used to promote the release of Star Trek II in the year nineteen eighty two. Most of the actors were interviewed here and this gave the series a wide market base since fans could interact freely with their heroes. Each of the six television series told exciting adventures of the characters on a space oriented environment. The animated series ran from the year nineteen seventy three to nineteen seventy four. The characters’ voices were based on the original characters voices The series definitely has portrayed several types of subtle gender stereotyping. Stereotypes are Explanations that explore the way that people develop impressions and views of social groups (McGarty 2002). The series is characterized by stereotyping in the form of functional ranking. All the original characters in the original series portray the male gender as having an upper hand in playing the role of the hero. In fact in the original series, all the main characters are male; the Captain, the Vulcan science officer and the old doctor. This clearly depicts the man as the stronger of the two sexes in the sense that only the man could have been the first to land in those locations that no one had ever laid foot on. All the successive series also depict the same phenomenon. An exception is the Deep Space Nine, which ran from the year nineteen ninety three to the year nineteen ninety nine. In this series, the character of colonel Kira Nerys is played by Nana Visitor who is a famous American actress. This series therefore tries to overcome the prevalent stereotyping by functional ranking. The next series in line, The Voyager is the one that really overcame this form of stereotyping by having Kate Mulgrew who played the role of Captain Kathryn Janeway. This is the very first series of Star Trek to have a female taking the leading role in the films. This new development earned the series a considerable goodwill and was in line with the increased push by the society for gender equality. This series whose plot begins on a seventy day voyage of the earth has the Captain lead the crew, and numerous disputes among the crew. Despite these challenges, the Captain is able to steer the crew all the way and at the end of the day, the series portrays the woman as able and capable of carrying out responsibilities previously thought of as manly. The lead role of Captain Kathryn leaves the audience with a completely different outlook on the roles of women in the society. It conveys the message that the female gender is not completely vulnerable. This is portrayed in all aspects of the situation since when it comes to fighting; the Captain is capable of taking out several men as well just as a male captain would do. Functional ranking is a common phenomenon in ancient movies and advertisements. This is because in the earlier times, the different cultural backgrounds of different societies viewed the female gender in a different way from the way it is today. Most communities viewed the woman as a helper to man and she could never be allowed to take on a man’s job. The most common task that women could never be allowed to undertake was being in a war front. In some communities they were not even allowed to carry weapons and their sole duties involved taking care of the men, while the men would take care of any other business including protection and feeding his family. This is why in the previous series of Star Trek, the female role was limited and the woman was never a hero in those earlier episodes. Another perspective to gender role stereotyping in Star Trek is portrayed in the form of relative size. This can be clearly seen in The Voyager series where Captain Kathryn has the lead role. The male aliens arising from the few last episodes of the series are all portrayed as being huge and bigger than the Captain. This is a form of stereotyping that is in almost all advertisement of that era. It is built in a person’s mind that the female gender is supposed to be smaller in size than their male counterparts. This stereotyping has infested most parts of this series since except the young; all the other male persons are bigger than their female counterparts. Even in the animated series, the male animated characters are exaggerative in their sizes. This form of stereotyping is strongly based on the traditional beliefs of mankind. Communities used to discriminate against women in many ways and as a result, men would be well fed and usually took on physical activities. This led to well built muscles for them. Therefore most men were bigger than women. This picture was carried forward in the creation of the Star Trek and this seems normal to the fans of the series. This is because the theories of gender stereotyping provide that any form of stereotyping is passed on from one generation to another through internalization of these events by children as a gender schema that is a cycle that is so hard to break. Family stereotyping is also evident in Star Trek. The original version is especially a victim of this stereotyping. The captain, the Vulcan and the Doctor are portrayed as family men trying to do their best for the well being of their families. The families of these characters look up to them as the sole bread winners of the families. These men are always away from their families, physically especially their sons or daughters. They are always on the move and most of the times they are never near their families. As the series evolves into the nineteen nineties, this stereotyping fades away as Captain Kathryn heads a seventy day voyage across the globe thereby leaving her family in the background. This series portrays the revolution of the role of the woman in the family and blurs the line between the role of the woman in a family and that of a man. The series can be said to be a bit conservative since in most of the earlier episodes, the sexuality of the male gender is clearly defined and there is no overlapping of natural aspects of sexuality. The male characters do not display awkward bisexualities. This is due to the fact that in those early times, it was against culture and morals to engage in some behaviors such as homosexuality and lesbianism. However, in the latest episodes of the series, the characters are being portrayed as very experimental. Most societies traditionally never allowed one of them to engage in unusual sexual behaviors and anyone practicing such behaviors would be excommunicated from the society and in some societies, he could even be sentenced to death. The Star Trek myth offers at least one historical claim and a technological solution to overcome the problem posed by too much diversity (Kapell 2010). The series portrays an emergence of a generation in which men cry, and are unable to hide their emotions, even in the presence of other people. Bisexuality and homosexuality has become a subject of intense debate. Men have even started applying makeup. Star Trek has a nice diverse cast of characters making it simply a must watch (Bernardi 1998). This has really revolutionized the way we view gender today. The roles that were previously well defined have now become so hard to define. Cases of domestic violence have taken a dramatic turn since there are cases of men being violated by women. There has been a concern in many parts of the globe about gender equality whereby the female gender is crying foul and would do anything to ensure equality between the male and female genders. Governments in many parts of the globe are putting policies in places to ensure that the female gender is accorded some more recognition and more power positions are delegated to women. Given the fact that the female gender dominates the globe in terms of numbers, the drive towards this cause is being pushed with renewed energy and therefore the confusion between the roles of women in the society and those of men. It is no longer the role of the woman to sit at home and look after children or cook and wash for the man. With the n propositions, it is more of teamwork since no gender is stronger than the other and no gender has the right of power over each other. Conclusively, Star Trek is more of an American icon of innovativeness and as a hub of entertainment and education. The history of western colonization is also a history of racialized discussion about what constituted humanity. Star Trek involves an elaborate discussion of these issues (Barret 2001). Star Trek has braved the heads of times in an era where entertainment is very dynamic and many great films have premièred and have not lasted more than a decade. It has been developed against a strong American background that makes many Americans to be much conversant with the happenings in the series. The series have definitely addressed the issue of gender equality and each episode displays movement towards the achievement of equality. Star Trek have won recognition in many countries around the globe since the American culture is a mixture of many countries and many countries find the American culture to be interesting (Dunne 2001). The creator and the writer of the story line manages to relate the real world with the imaginary future world very well and keeps the fans at the edge of their seats by offering them with scary yet thrilling action that augurs well with both the young and the older generations. Although gender stereotyping is evident in this series, there is a clear development in the improvement of their use. Star trek is one of the most successful series that America has ever had in the twentieth century and continues well into the twenty first century. Works Cited Dunne, M. Intertextual encounters in American fiction, film, and popular culture. Bowling Green, OH: Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 2001, Print. Barrett, Michèle, and Duncan Barrett. Star Trek: the human frontier. New York: Routledge, 2001, Print. Kapell, Matthew Wilhelm. Star Trek as Myth Essays on Symbol and Archetype at the Final Frontier.. Jefferson: McFarland & Co., Publishers, 2010, Print. Bernardi, Daniel. Star trek and history: race-ing toward a white future. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1998, Print. Read More