Star Trek: Oh, No! My Band is Popular


It’s the weirdest phenomenon.

All my life, no matter how dorked out I got, my peers have always been cool to me. Throughout junior high, I read comic books and steered clear of sports like pleasing my dad would send me into anaphylactic shock, but I never got picked on a day in my life. In my class, the jocks were jocular, and the class clown let me write some of his best stuff. If anything, it was almost like everyone was relieved to have me filling the role: “Awesome. The class has a bookworm already, so nobody’s going to think it’s me. I should invite that kid to my birthday party to help me look better in comparison.” It was an idyllic childhood.

Since becoming an adult, though…? I have taken shit from kids like you would not believe. It’s like I am wearing a sandwich board that says, “F*** With Me And See, Junior!” And not tough kids, either. Little girls. I get shit from little girls like I’m wearing last year’s jeans. I’ve had eight year olds in my apartment complex decide to just start calling me Gay Dude. I can barely get in and out of a Subway shop without some pizza face who looks like he should be struggling to break out of his locker getting way too close to me and piping up with, “Hey there, slugger! Having some honey mustard on there, buddy?” or something. (Do you know the kind of thing I mean? The bizarre menacing over-friendliness? Anybody else ever get that one? I mean… he’s not really interested in the mustard, is he? Am I reading this wrong?)

I can’t wrap my head around it. I guess I’m supposed to be going, “Mmmynahhh! Youths! Run away!” but I’m not even mad. I almost want to interview them. “How’s your spatial intelligence? Do you see how big I am? Do you realize that, as a member of the adult caste, I can pretty much get you thrown out of anywhere? Please complete this survey.”

I had another occasion to think about this over the weekend when I went to see Star Trek. I sometimes joke that I like to go to a movie on opening weekend a couple of times a year just to remind myself why I stopped going to the movies, but this crowd was actually pretty chilled out. Unfortunately, the people I was meeting were running late, so I was stuck hanging around by myself for a while. I decided I’d just sit in the back row until they got there.

A minute after I sat down, a couple of fourteen-year-old girls in front of me turned around and looked me up and down.

“Hey,” one of them said, smirking. “Big… big Star Trek fan, huh?”

Oh, awesome. This. Okay, let’s just shut this down quick.

“Nope!” I said. “Just heard it was a good movie. I was invited by some of my many, many friends. I’m just waiting for the ladies to get here. They’re ladies.”

Smoothly done.

I should have just gone with it full throttle. “Every episode of DS9 on tape, Rainbow Brite! And yeah, I abbreviate it in conversation. I’m just in a theater alone with a large popcorn I’m not sharing with anyone, watching a Star Trek movie! Qapla’, motherf***er!”

Instead, I had denied Star Trek. I felt like Saint Peter in that famous story, Jesus Christ Superstar. I just wasn’t in the mood. I thought, “Really? Do I need this in my life? It’s not like I’m sitting here in a Klingon hockey jersey. Mind you, I do have a Klingon hockey jersey, but they don’t know that. On any conscious level. Dude, I should totally be wearing that Klingon hockey jersey right now. I can’t believe I forgot… and this is why they make fun.”

(Seriously, though, I love that jersey. Just remembering it’s in the closet makes me laugh. It’s like a secret handshake; nobody gives you any shit about it, because the only people who would don’t know what the emblem on your chest is in the first place.)

The thing about this that amazes me is that, after my friends showed up, it happened again. We watched the film (loved it, by the way) and as the credits rolled we did the thing everyone is doing after this movie, namely turning to one another and reciting a debate-team list of reasons it was good. (Maybe that’s normal. Maybe it’s just been too long since I saw a movie you couldn’t nitpick into oblivion.) Just as we were raving about the brilliance of the alternate timeline loophole, a couple of kids sat down behind us and said to one of my friends, “Are you a Star Trek fan?”

Are you kidding me with this?

“Um…? I’ve seen a couple episodes, I guess.”

“Were you sad when they didn’t say ‘Beam me up, Scotty’ at the end?”

I started to get up. “What, are you writing a paper?”

Eek! The adults are fighting back! “I– I was just wondering.”

“And now ya know. Goodbye.”

I don’t get to use the word “scamper” enough, so I’m delighted to report they scampered off.

After they left, my friend Kelly (lady!) perfectly crystallized the really annoying part of the whole thing. “I can understand standing outside the Star Trek theater, and f***ing with me for being a dork when I come out. But these are people who bought tickets to Star Trek, and watched it, and then f***ed with people in the same theater as them for being trekkies.”

On this week’s iFanboy podcast, I joked, “For the first time in 43 years, Star Trek will be cool for 72 hours. Enjoy it.” I forgot about the downside of that. I forgot about what happens when your secret, insular thing suddenly belongs to everybody. When Madden comes out, and suddenly the meatheads who used to pick on gamers start becoming gamers. When the band you used to follow from club to club is suddenly on the radio, and you can’t afford tickets to their shows anymore. When, after years of your friends saying, “Really? Comic books? Still?” suddenly your grandma knows what hellboys are and you’re answering middle-aged coworkers’ questions about Wolverine continuity. You want to share the things you love with the world, in theory, but there’s always that other part: “Hey! Get out of the theater, kid. This is mine.”

All of the coolest people I’ve known throughout my life have outed themselves as Star Trek fans after I’ve gotten to know them, but only after I’ve gotten to know them. In fact, I only care about the show at all because cool people turned me on to it in college. My roommate was a punk rock fan, a part time ski instructor who was not above piercing an ear or dying his hair blue for the semester. Just when I thought I had him pegged, though, someone would say the words “Dyson sphere” to him and he would begin a tirade about Scotty and hypothetical physics that made you think you wandered into a chess club meeting. But Star Trek just was not first-date stuff. Maybe it could be now. Maybe mainstreaming doesn’t inevitably pollute everything. Sure, this movie brought teenage dickheads into the nerd sanctum, but maybe they’ll like it there. Maybe ten years from now, people will look at a trekkie the way they look at a guy who likes cars or World War II. Just another interest. “I saw Star Trek when I was a punk kid. Man, Star Trek was cool.”



Jim Mroczkowski boldly stays where no man has stayed before, specifically at Twitter and Jimski.com.

Comments

  1. i think i know how you feel my brother

  2. I worked as a teacher in a drug rehab for teens for about ten minutes and some of those kids were vicious little snots…not all, just some.  One of them that was a borderline sociopath who took the greatest pleasure in screwing with other people…was such a Lord of the Rings geek that it took my breath away.  Harry Potter fan, too.

     

    The world has changed.  There is no culture left for the punks who think they’re cooler than everyone else, so they’ve discovered OUR culture.  Lord of the Rings, Star Trek, comic books, freaking computers…they’re all mainstream now.  I should feel like I’ve won, like I outlasted all the idiots who made fun of me in high school, but I don’t.  I worked with these kids.  It’s why I stopped teaching.  On one level, yeah, it’s a little awesome that the teenage girl ringing up my stuff at Best Buy is quoting the new Star Trek movie to me.  But she’s attracted to the shine of something that’s cool.  Does she really get it?  Does she want to?  I think there’s hope if the answer to the second question is yes.

  3. Don’t believe it! Just ’cause Hollywood is mining the geek lore for $ doesn’t mean that any gives a shit or understands it. If another saddo tries to chat me up by asking if I’m excited about that shitty Wolverine movie I will gut them with a spoon. They don’t get us, but now they _think_ they do, which is worse than when they just thought I was some exotic nut job to be avoided. People now think they know about comics ’cause they "saw that film with the blue guy" (I shit you not, a guy said that to me when he found out I liked comics, in an attempt to prove that he did too!), they don’t get it.

  4. Avatar photo Paul Montgomery (@fuzzytypewriter) says:

    It’s such a painful thing. Not just seeing it in others, but recognizing it in yourself. That intense feeling of anxiety that somebody likes something you like for all the wrong reasons. As if that somehow cheapens your genuine devotion. It’s somehow worse than them dismissing the thing we love. "How dare you clowns like this thing incorrectly!" I think we’re all guilty of it in some way. 

  5. I think it’s an ugly road to turn down when you get exclusive about your passions. My policy is to let people get as much enjoyment out of things as they want, then move along.  Not that it doesn’t lead to some irritating conversations.

  6. Someone is going to get an orange ring if they aren’t careful.

  7. Avatar photo Paul Montgomery (@fuzzytypewriter) says:

    Is that your actual yearbook photo or is that a fan club thing?  

  8. Great article.  It’s entirely possible that, these days, I completely fail to have social contact of any kind with people who are not nerds (or, at least, nerd-tolerant).  For obvious reasons, I have mixed feelings about this. 

  9. Try teaching (Psst doing this on my prep hour) and being mocked by teenage girls because you have no clue who or what a Nautro or a single vampire in twilight books. That was almost like geek on geek violence for me the first time some kid laughed at me because I had no clue about some new hype.  I felt like declaring but I am Hip!  I am only 25 and knew about "Watchmen" wayyyyyy before you guys were in Kindergarten. 

     I blame this damn internet for so many subculture or geekish things going mainstream.

  10. @Paul I definitely used to have the problem where I got upset about people not enjoying things "properly" but now I just don’t care as long as people are enjoying something.  Maybe it’s just "old age" (not that I’m as old as Jim or anything)

  11. Have you considered moving out of the Third Circle of Hell and into a real city/state combination? 🙂

     

  12. We’re benefiting from a universal convergence of something being acknowledged by the masses and that something being good.  Normally, if something is this popular, it isn’t good by our standards- too FX driven, no plot, no characterization, just crap.  But recently what’s popular has also become good.  Dark Knight, LotR, Iron Man, Watchmen, and now Star Trek.  We cannot bring ourselves to deny their quality, and many others are agreeing.

    And for every punk kid who looks like they’re going to laugh at you, there are five who look up to you.  Be a role model for them; show them the way. To paraphrase Reed Richards from "Rise of the Silver Surfer" "Yes, we stayed in our homes on Saturday nights watching Star Trek and playing D&D while they were out being star quarterback and getting all the girls- and now they are coming to us for their entertainment.  So who’s on the winning side now?"

  13. Oh, and btw; you need this bumper sticker. A friend of mine has it on his car and a Klingon symbol pin on one of his leather jackets, yet never mentions Trek unless someone else brings it up.

     

  14. I got really scared when my friend who for ten years I’ve been trying without success to show Star Trek to. Called me up and invited me to see this movie with him. Then things got worse when I was in line at the theatre reading an old Catwoman comic (there was a book store that sold back issues a block from the theatre) and two teenagers called snickered to eachother about me, calling me a nerd and such. I politely pointed out to them that they were seeing a Star Trek movie and that shut them up. But it still annoyed me.

    This sort of thing always happens, I remember being teased for doing a book report on The Hobbit in seventh grade. Before the Lord of the Rings movies came out. My policy is to pretend this sort of person doesn’t exist and it’s still a thing that used to get me made fun of in school. Sure these people may like it, but I know they don’t like it in the same way as me, and I take comfort in that.

  15. That’s a nice teddy bear that Robert Kirkman’s holding.

  16. You can think that’s Robert Kirkman. Just as long as nobody really thinks that’s a picture of me. That’s not even a picture of my jersey.

    The guy at the top is me, though.

  17. I  always forget that I seem to be in the minority amongst "geeks", I was never picked on at school, I don’t have people make fun of me for liking stuff (Well, aside, from Gilmore Girls) and I get along fine with "civilians".  It seems like usually one or more of those things have happened to a lot of fans of comics, sci-fi, etc…

  18. Oh… okay, I’ll give you that. No one makes fun of me. But they really don’t "get" it either, and that’s as annoying.

  19. @sonia Not "getting" it doesn’t bother me at all.  Who says there’s just one way to "get" something anyway?  There’s nothing inherently wrong with digging Watchmen or Hellboy solely as a movie. 

  20. I love that story. But I think you’ve got it all twisted. These impressionable yutes were trying to make a connection with a cool guy who could fill them on this Star Trek world. I’m really worried that now that you shut them down they’re going to slouch home in shame and burn effigies of Gene Roddenberry in retaliation for not being let into the cool club.

  21. This is like high times for people like me and other ‘geeks’ (excuse the expression). Comic book films are big right now, Star Trek is now a huge thing again, and classic 80’s cartoons (Transformers, GI Joe) are around the corner. I’d say that even if there are jocks and preps around we rule society now.

    But yet I am still jester of this Jersey kingdom…

  22. I’m fine with sharing my loves, but agree completely with Josh that it leads to annoying conversations.  Try explaining the various lantern corps to a friend and see how many times they stare at you with blank looks.  Then watch them get excited when you tell them a Green Lantern movie is in the works. 

    Side Note: I had to explain how hoping to win the lottery was still avarice, and eventually…I just let it go.

  23. Maybe its b/c im young (23) and while i feel the same as Jim to some extent, i have to say that without these things going mainsteam would we still have the things we love? Marvel was bankrupt before spider mand and the x-men movies. Also in my senior year of high school i was able to take a Sci-fi/fantasy english class. If thats not due to at least some main stream acceptance then i dont know how why the class was that full. Finally i think that some exposure is better then none, we want the things we love to continue and for that we need new fans,  if 2 out of every 7 people who go see star trek this summer end up delving into the rich history that is the Star Trek U then thats a win in my book, yes you will have the snotty kids that poke fun, but in the end thats thier lose.

  24. sigh

  25. Never said it on the show.  Why should they say "Beam me up, Scotty" in the movie?  I know.  It’s a small point.  Still.

  26. @drake  You know, I *like* comic books, and whenever someone tries to explain the various Lantern Corps’es to me, I fall asleep.  I think it’s like any conversation, you need to try and be sensitive to what the other person wants to know, not just what you want to talk about.  But what doesn’t make sense is people who want to know what you know, then mock you for knowing it. 

  27. Wow, I like Star Trek and Wars, Comic Books, DnD, played Magic, Video Games before they caught on, computers too as well as all kinds of fantasy stuff and never got talked down too about any of it in grade school, high school, university or now. Still don’t, I’m the only 30 year old guy in a workplace of 90 people who all know my proclivities for the geek stuff and usually the only conversations I get are, I saw the X-Men movie and this didn’t make sense can you explain it and are the comic books the same? Which I’m happy too.

    I don’t even know anything about sports the big "in", for most people in workplaces. I always thought the "Nerds: The Movie" didn’t really happen that much in real life. On second inspection with me it is probably due to the fact I’m physically intimidating and once you get by that I’m easy going and socially capable, not the "stereotypical" shy comic guy I didn’t notice others from my circle having much issue either though, bullying or snide jack assery wasn’t much of an issue in my schools.

    I only ever had one issue with a jockish type in high school and once I told him what I would do to him with his arm once I detached it from his torso, I never had a problem with him again. His buddy apologized later and just said he was being dickish because his g/f broke up or moved away I can’t remember exactly, it’s been over 12 years. 

  28. It ain’t the things you like that make you nerdy is all I’m saying.

  29. All I know that when Deadpool the film comes out I know I was cool before everyone else. 🙂

  30. Avatar photo Paul Montgomery (@fuzzytypewriter) says:

    You’re assuming…a lot about the Deadpool movie. 

  31. You shouldn’t have been such a jerk to the second group of kids. That stuff makes an impact

  32. @josh Bingo

  33. Oh also am I the only person who thought of Mark from Peep Show getting chased by kids when they were reading the article?  Especially the line about "Gay Dude"

  34. btw, the title should read "Oh, nos! My band is popular" then end with T_T. Just thought you should knows.

  35. I don’t understand the apparent gripe about kids being able to see you for what you are, a Star Trek fan. I don’t understand why that’s upsetting. It’d logically be upsetting if you weren’t a bit Star Trek fan but they took you for one, but not the other way around. You’re a nerd–so what. But…I don’t get many of the articles written on iFanboy anymore. I can’t sympathize with all of this advanced geekdom, where you’re simultaneously proud to be a geek but also indignant about other people assuming you are, basically, what you are. I don’t get it. And all the namby-pamby politicking, worrying about whether people "like" certain things for "the right reasons" or whatever. I just think it’s a waste of effing time to even worry about that. But, christ, I’m sorry, but it’s disheartening to read a bunch of the above comments, written by presumably 20- and 30-somethings, where you’re all basically afraid of what little kids think of you. Is this a support group for young adults who are scared of children? I guess the children, mean and small-minded as they are, might have a lot of you guys figured out: it doesn’t matter that you’re physically bigger than them if you’re so insecure that with just a few choice words they can throw you into a self-doubing, passive-agressive tizzy. Sorry if that sounds mean, but jeesh guys…"man-up", huh? And if that’s a sexist term, then try "grow up" a little. Clean up your act, get your own mental house in order, and you’ll be more confident and relaxed in who you are.

  36. Whoops, I wrote "bit" when I meant "big". "It’d logically be upsetting if you weren’t a BIG Star Trek fan but they took you for one, but not the other way around."

  37. The examinations of self doubt and uncontrollable social anxiety are interesting topics for discussion. Would that all could be as self assured as random internet posters tell us to be.

  38. @flapjaxx. I feel like you missed the slightly comedic tone of this article.

     @everyone else. I’m a senior in high school and openly enjoy comics, sci-fi flicks and the like. Since it’s Star Trek week in cinemaland, I’ve been approached by almost all of my friends and have had to turn them away for the first time in what seems like years since I know nothing about the series. I’m part of the driveling masses for once. It’s an odd sensation. I’m usually part of the "in crowd" with movies like this. They’ve all asked me about Iron Man, Wolverine and The Dark Knight. I’ve handed out more comics than I can count. It’s rather ridiculous, but it’s really cool. I think it all comes down to attitude whether you get made fun of or picked on or whatever. Like Josh said,  it’s not what you like that makes you nerdy. 

  39. I hate the term "man-up"

  40. You know, there’s an interesting phenomenon which a few people have alluded to, which is people being geeky about what we don’t think of as geeky properties.  I had a roommate who would watch entire seasons of ‘Friends’ on DVD, and drop esoteric ‘Friends’ references into conversation.  I have coworkers who spend an hour each morning after ‘American Idol’ deconstructing it in detail, and others who DVR ‘Young & the Restless’ every day and spend 20 minutes of a work meeting talking over their theories for upcoming storylines.  And don’t even get me started on fantasy sports.  Hell, I have friends for whom the stock market is basically a fandom. 

    The state of our entertainment media — wikipedia, itunes, netflix, DVR timeshifting, etc — makes it relatively easy to be obsessive in the way that used to require, say, staying up late to record all-night ‘Buffy’ marathons on VHS, to make sure we were caught up.  So the effort involved in being a geek isn’t what it used to be.  Whether this transfers into actual classic geek properties like ‘Trek’ being more mainstream in the longterm, I’m not sure, but there are certainly things like Harry Potter that straddle the line between mainstream and fandom.

  41. It could be good in some ways that the "nerd" world is gitting some spott light.  Star Trek was kind of circling the drain for a bit, now its revitalized.  More movies and shows maybe?  That seems better then it crapping out to nothing.  However, I do feel angry when pepol claim that there comic experts from seeing the movies.  It sort of like saying you know all about cars because you watched the Fast and the Furious movies.  You don’t really know shit!

     

  42. I’m prettu drunk but I wanted to add this to the coversation:

    *goes to jukebox and presses, Jack the  Ripper by Link Wray is played in the background*

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2sxYfBLLmA

     Mixing Arak with energy drinks (XL and mainly XO) with a little bit of Pernod ( a french drink) is nice but pretty intoxicating.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arak_(distilled_beverage)

    I’ll read the rest of the article and responses later… I think I’m going to pass out. 

  43. Anyone who is enthusiastic about anything is a geek about that thing in my book.

  44. Trekkies carry a special type of stigma. Mostly because most comic-book nerds are saying "read comics", trekkies will be found discussing how the phasers can’t be magenta, becuase the crystals are for harfgar IX or something. Yes I know, there are comic book fans like that, but they aren’t certainly that loud.

  45. @TheAbonimableDan – the first Hebrew version of The Hobbit was done by Israeli pilots that were captured by Egyptians I think and translated it while i jail. Nobody gave me shit for reading it before the movies came out. Maybe getting read and translated by pilots in an enemy’s jail shuts up all those folks?

    But I once got laughed at for wearing a school t-shirt (everything else was in the laundry) to a different school, but some teenager I knew stood up for me, and another guy made fun of me using bigger buttons for my Gameboy – bought some add-ons package that had bigger buttons you could place on the Gameboy – he basically made fun of me having big thumbs, but I stopped giving a fuck about humanity a long time ago, so I didn’t mind.

    If they’re girls laugh at them for having periods and having to do a Houdini routine each morning trying to get that tempex shit in. Yeah bitches – I have my sources 🙂 Push-up bras are also something to laught at. Use their insecurity against them! 

  46. … what?

  47. @chlop… You win strangest post on ifanboy… again.

  48. Thanks. There are more to come. I’m more strange when I’m not drunk. Drinking is like an antidote…

  49. Avatar photo Timmy Wood (@TimmyWood) says:

    Those are some nosy ass kids. I bet people would pick on me too if I wasn’t so damn good looking.

     

    That last parts a joke. They would still pick on me despite my looks.

  50. @JumpingJupiter – Exactly what I was going to say. If you’ve ever been in an art school, the one place comic and scifi geeks should be flourishing, you know there are big cliques there, too, and everyone talks about the slightly sequestered and above-it-all fashion majors. To me, those kids are geeks, too. The only difference? They like shopping for clothes as opposed to comics. They wait for the next season of fashion where as we wait anxiously for every new comic wednesday. They know Gucci, Dolce & Gabbana, and Ed Hardy like the back of their hand. We know Jim Lee, Ed Brubaker, and Jack Kirby. It’s all the same.

    Whether it’s a good thing that geek culture has gone mainstream? I think so. I get into annoying conversations all the time now about this or that comic movie or cartoon because my coworkers know me as the "comic guy". Every monday after some movie comes out they all ask whether I liked it or not like I’m their personal meter for such things. It’s fine as long as the movies keep coming and the culture spreads. If more people are reading The Watchmen that’s good. So what if they don’t remember who the "blue guy" is or that Batman in the movie is in a different continuity than the comic book. I don’t know who the heck Vera Wang is or what A-Rod is.

    My point being, all things new are gonna be scary. For both sides. Geeks are gonna be protective of what they thought to be theirs alone like a mother letting her child go off to college. And everyone else is going to be questioning whether they should actually be liking what they’re seeing. It’s OK. Everything is going to be fine. Just go with it. Everything will shake out in the end. The folks who came into Star Trek through JJ and the new kids might stay for more and start learning Klingon and bone up on the laws of the Federation (or whatever it’s called).  And some will move onto the next shiny object that Hollywood places in front of them. And the cycle of pop culture life continues…. 

  51. @gobo Not "getting it" means that they don’t care even a tiny bit about the film they just assume that ’cause it’s bases on a comic they’ve got an "in" with me, which they don’t.

  52. Don’t worry, Jimski, i still think Star Trek is stupid and lame! thank me later, mate

  53. OUTSTANDING ARTICLE!

    In today’s Nerd-Pop environment, I hear people talking and pretending like they know whats what. Be wary of these charlatans! Here is a "fer instance…"

    I am at the first showing of Dark Knight. I am sitting in the theater listening to the hushed conversations as we wait for the film to start and a young couple in front of me are talking..

    Young Woman says to young man: "I am so glad I came to this with someone who knows about Batman." (Awesome! a nerd brother landed a date cuz of his immense Comic Book acumen!)

    Then it happens!

    Young Man says to young lady: "Yep! Pay attention to the Blond lawyer. Later on in the film he becomes the villain HALF AND HALF."

    HALF AND HALF!?!?!?!??!?!?!?!   IMPOSTER!!!! POSEUR!!!!!! 

    This clown with too much hair product is here under false nerd credentials!!!

    I let it slide and only looked down and slowly shook my head. 

  54. The front rows in the screening I attended last night laughed a little too hard at certain parts.  I thought it was adorable.

    Also, 45% of the audience was Asian.  (I’m including myself in the calculations.)

    My girlfriend calls them "phaser pistols".  Normally that would enrage me but the way she says it is so cute.

  55. @sonia OH!  Yeah that kind of not "getting" it is incredibly irritating. 

  56. Brilliant article Jim. I’ve been through the same thing myself. My advice to you is to wear it on your sleeve and let your freak flag fly. When someone asks you if you’re a Star Trek fan, get indignant in the assurance that you’ve been a fan far longer than the snot nosed tween facing you. Take solace that the fandom of you and all the others that have been supporting this series for most of your lives is solely responsible for this kick ass movie that the masses love so much.

  57. And I hope these people that we’re talking about realize that without geeks/nerds/dorks, there would basically be no summer movie season. With one or two exceptions (I’m looking at you Michael Bay), these directors and writers are rarely the type of sloven morons whose only multisyllabic word in their vocabulary is "’splosions" (as in, "I like ‘splosions", or "Let’s get a really BIG ‘splosion"). We rule popular culture baby, and that term isn’t meant to be ironic. "Popular" is part of that term for a reason.

  58. I fear young people.  

  59. @unoob. I had a similar experience at a Dark Knight screening. I feel bad, but I outed the guy. I don’t plan on doing that again. Felt like a total dick.

  60. Without such progress, we couldn’t have marched openly. The 20th century was a darker time for the geek.

    March and raise your geek flag high!

    http://www.heroesrun.org.uk 

  61. oh a  topic near and dear to my heart ( i have a teenage sister) i think its more to do with kids pickin on fanboys , because thats what kids do.  i mean my sister stood in line all day for twilight and put my fanboy obession to shame buying all the merchendise etc. but when she mocked me for doing the same for a comic book, i just told her your one of US now….. the look of fright and realazation on her face was priceless lol.  i think sonja wrote an article like this.

  62. Jeez, Jim–we must be having the same kind of week…my article’s very age aware too…nice work man!!

  63. I caught the comment on this week’s podcast and it made me laugh.  This was a great article.

     I had pretty much left Star Trek behind, since obviously nothing new was coming out and my nerd centre of my brain was being taken up by the comic books that Trek had initially replaced when the ’90s chased me away. 

     How dorky was I?  I wore a Star Trek uniform to high school, and not just on Halloween but during a regular school day.  Granted it was the day that All Good Things was airing and I was "commemorating" the end of TNG, but yeah nobody else knew that.  And of course I took shit for the next year and a half until I graduated, but then again I knew I would.

    Seeing Star Trek being popular, in as much as it is, is actually nice in my mind.  If the new film is a gateway drug to either the original series or one of those that followed it (especially TNG and DS9) then that’s great.  If it means they’ll make another movie, that’s great.  If it brings forth another TV show one day, that’s even better.  My inner nerd brain needs some new Star Trek, I need a reason to horrify (and sadden) my fiancee by buying a new Trek uniform.  If that means some punk kids like Star Trek along with the Spongebob and President Obama, then I’m willing to accept that.

  64. be who you are…i flaunt my geekiness and thats what makes me who i am.

  65. be who you are…i flaunt my geekiness and thats what makes me who i am.

  66. The world will always be full of thoughtless and cruel people who get off on tearing down everyone and everything around themselves for the pure pleasure of the act. "Mean people suck" is a adage almost as essential in knowing as "Do unto others". It all comes down to Karma: You will get in return what you give out. (It’s a nice thought anyway.) Life is about community, support and discovery. That is why the Arts and Entertainment are such a joy: There is so much to discover, share and ultimately be shaped and transformed by. It is the gift of the artist, whether in a high class gallery or a shoebox theatre playing a popcorn film: to touch and engage the heart and mind with a line of ink, a carefully chosen word or an action whether technical or in movement. Life is too short to humor those whose sole passion is to be cruel and exclusionary; The world has already suffered too long at the hands of those types.