William Shatner accuses "self righteous strangers" at Paramount+ of "erasing" his Captain Kirk
By Dan Selcke
Star Trek is in as good a place as it ever has been. There are several shows either on the air or on the way, including Star Trek: Discovery, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Star Trek: Lower Decks, and maybe even a new movie starring Patrick Stewart as Jean-Luc Picard, and this not long after his own Picard wrapped up. There's something for every Star Trek fan out there, which is impressive when you consider that the franchise has been around since the 1960s.
Well, maybe not every fan is being fed well. If you're a fan of William Shatner's portrayal of Captain Kirk in the original series from the '60s, you may notice that he's not prominently displayed in marketing materials on Paramount+. Shatner certainly has, and he feels a certain kind of way about it, answering a fan's question about whether he could return as Kirk in a Picard-like series like this:
All you have to do is look at the Paramount+ graphics to answer that question. 😉 https://t.co/B4Rc9iUJGZ pic.twitter.com/uJEqIL7QZ7
— William Shatner (@WilliamShatner) January 6, 2024
Apparently, in Shatner's head, the lack of his Captain Kirk in marketing material is evidence of Paramount+ employees feeling "threatened by the Kirk character," as he said in another tweet:
It’s not the first time it’s been going on for years. It makes no difference to me that a group who think they are “enlightened” (or whatever they think they are) obviously feels threatened by the Kirk character. It’s a character from a 1960’s TV show- get over it.😉🤣 https://t.co/0QLH8HBc2O pic.twitter.com/ZR3vevL0U9
— William Shatner (@WilliamShatner) January 8, 2024
And he kept going in this vein. "It doesn’t bother me in the least," he wrote on Twitter. "A bunch of self righteous strangers thinking they are sending a message by erasing the past? Who is going to forget? It’s everywhere. It’s so indoctrinated that it will take many generations to be forgotten no matter what they do. Let it be."
This looks to me like it's verging dangerously on "old man yells at cloud" territory. For instance, Shatner is purportedly unbothered by Paramount+ "erasing the past," but Star Trek: The Original Series is represented in all of the marketing materials that Shatner is tweeting about; it's just that the chosen representative on those images is Leonard Nimoy's Spock, not William Shatner's Kirk. I feel like Shatner would take that as evidence that Paramount+ is prejudiced against him specifically, but there's nothing obviously inappropriate with choosing to go with Nimoy's Spock, who is at least as iconic as Shatner's Kirk.
But maybe Shatner knows something I don't; I'm sure he's had more discussions with Paramount+ executives than me. If you like, you can ask him on a 2024 holiday cruise to Antarctica, which he advertised on the back of the attention he got for this tweet-storm:
Friends, you can join me on an adventure of a lifetime: a voyage to the frozen continent of Antarctica! Space is limited book now: https://t.co/ybtguQM3WF. Yours truly along with retired NASA Astronaut @StationCDRKelly hosted by #FeeltheWild's @DanielFox + @DrChrispyMusic in… pic.twitter.com/Z3lu9bRA6N
— William Shatner (@WilliamShatner) January 8, 2024
The man knows how to market, you've gotta give it to him.
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h/t TrekMovie.com