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Archive of stories pre April 2007 | News submitted by: MIB
LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- Excuse Patrick Stewart if he sounds a bit envious of those bad eggs who befoul his "Star Trek" universe while his heroic Capt. Jean-Luc Picard mops up after them.
Like most sci-fi, fantasy and action franchises, "Star Trek" often lives and dies on the strength of its villains. "Star Trek: Nemesis," the 10th big-screen adventure for the crew of the starship Enterprise, opens Friday and has one of the series' most intriguing premises for an archenemy: a young Picard clone whose harsh upbringing has made him a hateful, murderous monster.
The Picard duplicate Shinzon, played by British actor Tom Hardy, gets to rage and bully in a manner that Stewart's noble character never would dream of.
"There always seems to be a much wider range of opportunities for actors when playing a bad guy," Stewart said. "Occasionally, you get these ambivalent good guys, and they're interesting. But to be evil brings more complexity than playing a clear-cut hero. Most actors always have a lot of fun investigating the worst side of human nature."
And successfully capturing that dark side goes a long way toward creating an entertaining yarn.
What would "Star Wars" be without Darth Vader, where would Harry Potter be without Voldemort? The best James Bond flicks generally have the most memorable bad guys, such as Gert Frobe as the title character in "Goldfinger" (with a great assist from Harold Sakata as Oddjob) or Robert Shaw in "From Russia With Love." As lovable scoundrel Lex Luthor in "Superman," Gene Hackman stole the show from Christopher Reeve.
The rants of Khan
"Star Trek" offered up one of sci-fi's great villains in the second movie, "The Wrath of Khan." As genetic superman Khan, a role he created in an episode of the original "Star Trek" TV show, Ricardo Montalban took William Shatner's James Kirk and the Enterprise on an explosive deep-space dogfight, all the while snarling paraphrased snatches of Capt. Ahab's vengeful rants from "Moby Dick."
Part of Khan's appeal was his deep connection to Kirk, rancor that festered after the Enterprise captain exiled him to a wasteland for 15 years. "Star Trek: Nemesis" screenwriter John Logan said the aim for the new movie was to create that sort of antagonism between Picard and Shinzon.
"In any story, if there's a personal connection between the hero and villain, it gives you more opportunity for drama," said Logan, whose screenplay credits include "Gladiator." "The dramatic possibilities here were all the better because the villain not only is equal to Picard, he is Picard."
Along with Montalban, "Star Trek" has drawn an impressive lineup of actors as villains, among them Christopher Plummer ("Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country"), Malcolm McDowell ("Star Trek: Generations"), Christopher Lloyd ("Star Trek III: The Search for Spock"), and Academy Award winner F. Murray Abraham ("Star Trek: Insurrection").
Generally, the more menacing the foe, the better the movie clicks with audiences. "Wrath of Khan" was a big hit, Plummer's turn as a Shakespeare-spouting Klingon miscreant gave "The Undiscovered Country" a boost, and Alice Krige's creepy Borg Queen, a cybernetic seductress, helped make "Star Trek: First Contact" the most successful of the franchise's recent films.
"I've got to confess a terrific attraction for the Borg Queen. I wouldn't mind spending time with her," Stewart said of the leader of the part-flesh, part-machine Borg race. "She is beautiful and deadly, sensual and horrifying. She's sexy and repellant, and one of the nice things is, she has a sense of humor. I think that made her especially strong."
Conversely, the least popular movie, "Star Trek V: The Final Frontier," offered mundane foes -- a soft-spoken Vulcan, a fairly innocuous Klingon and a none-too-sinister entity posing as God.
Fandom menace?
A strong bad guy, though, is not the only key to success.
"Star Trek" scored its only $100 million hit with the fourth movie installment, "The Voyage Home," which had no villain, just a giant space probe that menaced Earth. That film had broad appeal beyond "Trek" fans because it was more slapstick comedy than sci-fi adventure.
Still, the "Star Trek" filmmakers hope Hardy's Shinzon provides the same sort of lift the wicked Borg Queen and Khan brought to their movies.
"I think the Borg Queen and Khan were wonderful villains. They were scary and threatening and memorable," said the film's producer, Rick Berman, who took over from the late Gene Roddenberry as the franchise's shepherd. "I believe everyone will agree when they see this film that Shinzon is in the same category."
http://www.cnn.com/2002/SHOWBIZ/Movies/12/12/sproject.ca02.film.trek.villains.ap/index.html
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