Some have referred to it as ‘the Return of Captain Kirk’.
I think that might be misleading. It’s more likely to be the last we will ever see of William Shatner – or at least his likeness – in the iconic role.
At the behest of a friend (and fellow Trekkie), I watched the Captain Kirk short film ‘Unification’ that was published online in recent days by the Roddenberry Archive.
The short video – a complex artistic undertaking by – has been raved about online for days, with old-school Trek fans in particular hyping it up and getting emotional.
Here’s a link to the full film. And the background to the project, and the Roddenberry Archive in general, can be explored here at the official website.
Full disclosure here: I’m a massive fan of Captain Kirk and of William Shatner’s decades-long portrayal of that character.
In fact, my earliest memory of film itself is watching the network television premiere of The Wrath of Khan as a child: and becoming enamoured with both the character and the franchise.
I’m sure I might’ve seen other films before that, but this is the one that lingers most vividly from my childhood memory.
It’s also my first memory of ever having shed a tear during a movie.
And fittingly enough then, I have to admit I did find this new video a little emotional too. But also a touch underwhelming: probably due to it being so hyped up by fans.
Maybe I expected something a bit… more.
Reading into the background, however, of the project, why it was undertaken and what it was intending to capture, I think it’s fair to say this very short film succeeds not only in showcasing the filmmaking technology, but capturing a very palpable feeling or essence.
To summarise the video itself, it features a Star Trek: Generations era Captain Kirk appearing in an evocative location, where we soon find he has come to visit a dying Spock.
Needless to say, the premise alone would be enough to play on some fans’ emotions. It is widely felt that Kirk’s death in Star Trek: Generations thirty years ago was underwhelming and unfitting for so giant and iconic a character in the annals of fiction.
The great James T. Kirk didn’t get the ending he deserved, it has long been held – particularly bitterly by some hardcore fans.
Well, ‘Unification’ appears to remedy that somewhat. Here, we are made to infer, Kirk is in fact alive, having somehow survived the events of ‘Generations’.
And we get a tender reunion between him and Spock, the implication being Spock is near death.
And yes, the visual presentation and the music throughout the video is overwrought and deliberately intended to evoke maximum pathos.
But I guess that can be forgiven, given that this video has a very short span of time in which to capture its vision.
Myself, I’m not sure whether it’s the brief return of Kirk and Spock the characters that I’m reacting to most: or the image of Shatner and the late Leonard Nimoy in what is, via all this technical magic, surely their final onscreen moment.
Given that we’ve in fact seen versions of Kirk and Spock onscreen in recent years, such as in the J.J Abrams movies or more recently in the Strange New Worlds streaming series, and that none of that evoked any emotion from me, I have to conclude it’s about specifically Shatner and Nimoy’s iconic presence in those roles.
The fact that this isn’t actually them in the flesh, but advanced simulacrum, could be a hindrance: but in this case it isn’t, because the footage is so short and to the point.
So, even though there’s a few moments of uncanny valley, it’s not really a hindrance to the spirit and intent of the project.
This is in contrast, for example, to Lucasfilm’s de-ageing/CG version of a younger Mark Hamill or Luke Skywalker in the terrible Book of Boba Fett series a few years ago – which stretched the illusion too far and ended up feeling completely unreal.
It helps that there’s no dialogue whatsoever in this short film: so no awkwardness of utilising re-speecher technology or inserting doctored audio.
It really is less an attempt at story, and more a tone poem.
This nine minutes or so of footage feels like an attempt to capture a feeling, crystallise a moment or idea, and to resonate at a level beyond details.
There’s a surreal, dream-like quality to it that works in its favour. I did actually feel like I was in a dream-like state for a few minutes.
I think also the ambiguity of the scenario is smart. It isn’t clear at all – or even important – whether this is meant to be the ‘real’ Kirk, or which timeline this is, or how precisely it fits into established lore, or any of that pedantic nonsense.
I’ve somewhat lost my bearings with modern Star Trek, so having this be somewhat ambiguous suits me.
Again, its more about evoking a feeling or idea than about slotting neatly into overly convoluted fictional canon.
Is it rewriting Generations? Maybe. While I always found that film vaguely enjoyable, it was very badly conceived. And it botched the end of Captain Kirk’s decades-long onscreen odyssey.
So reimagining this character’s ultimate fate (and providing a belated epilogue for both Kirk and Spock) seems fair game.
A previous offering, ‘Regeneration’ (video above), about a year ago, showed a digitally recreated Spock, in the likeness of Leonard Nimoy, visiting the site of Kirk’s burial from Generations. It’s a nice prologue or mirror to this new Kirk-centered film.
‘There are always possibilities…’ That’s the only line of spoken dialogue in this new film – and it’s an insert taken from The Wrath of Khan, one of the greatest films of all time.
But this one re-appropriated line is all that’s needed here – it’s just suggestive enough, yet just ambiguous enough, to fit the tone and vision perfectly.
For all we know, this is a dream Kirk is having. Or this might even be the afterlife. Certainly there’s an unreality and overtly idyllic quality to the scene that could be suggestive of that.
The opening text at the start of the film could be suggestive of an after-death experience too: it’s another Wrath of Khan line, the one about how we deal with death being just as important as how we deal with life.
But really, the nature of this scenario is completely open to interpretation – which, again, is nice.
The point is that this film doesn’t try to explain or specify: which is to its benefit.
I couldn’t take a whole movie like this, done in this fashion: but as a short snapshot, and moreover an obvious love letter to Kirk, Spock and Star Trek, it hits the mark perfectly.
Other than being, again, an obvious demonstration of the technical and filmmaking capabilities, ‘Unification’ is clearly intended as a little ‘gift’ to fans: and, again, an obvious love letter to an icon.
And it works.
Shatner himself was involved in this project, and is credited as an executive producer, along with Susan Nimoy and the Nimoy estate.
And if it is our final image of classic Shatner as James T. Kirk, it’s a fitting one.
I think that’s all it’s meant to be.
Man, I love this character. And I genuinely appreciate this artistic offering.
