Star Trek ‘Refurbished’

Like the lower price-point game consoles you can get at Gamestop, Star Trek (the original series) is getting refurbished.

You can read the entire article here, at StarTrek.com (from yesterday), but the rundown is that the original episodes are going to be re-mastered, namely in the special effects department, but also in the music. Among the things to be re-done are the show’s opening, backgrounds from on-planet moments, exterior shots of the vessel, and viewscreen shots. Expect a lotta CGI work to go down.

Oddly, instead of heading directly to DVD, it’s going to air on TV first, with the first episode dropping on September 16th. Didn’t anybody tell these guys all the cool kids are on DVD sets? And besides, what channel is it going to be on? All news reports are telling me to check my local listings, but my local listings don’t go out that far. Will it be on CBS? UPN? I’m assuming it won’t be on G4 or SpikeTV. Or at least, it won’t be for a good 10 years.

Interestingly, there was a fan doing work on this already, who put in a bid for this project. Obviously, without the vast resources of a visual effects company, he couldn’t compete, but on the upside, a clip of what he made is available on YouTube. You can find it under the title Trek Refurbished.

It’s an interesting look at what we might be seeing when this hits. His site can be found at TrekEnhanced.com, where the most interesting draw right now is his talk about this new development, where he discusses his bid, and how he actually pitched this three years ago in 2003.