Kahn: The Real Nemesis

(I've found a great site with Star Trek motivational posters like this at http://echosphere.net/star_trek_insp/star_trek_insp.html. Check it out for a lot of good stuff)

In preparation for the new Star Trek movie Courtney and I have watched all ten previous Star Trek movies. Thursday night we finished it off with Nemesis, which I had never before seen. Turned out to be a great show, of course, because Patrick Stewart is awesome. As I thought about the movie more that night, I came to a realization of why it was such a great movie--it was fashioned after the manner of the greatest of all Star Treks, even Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn. Here's why:

1) The villain who want nothing more than to kill the Captain.

Okay, so this is a stretch, because Praetor Shinzon wanted to destroy the entire human race, but it's no stretch to say that he couldn't live without killing Picard. In fact, that's the entire reason he tried to kill him. Both Kahn and Shinzon had beef with the captain of the Enterprise. One wanted revenge, the other wanted life.

2) Both involved the prevention of the usage of a weapon of global destruction.

Kahn stumbles upon the Genesis project which, while meant to create life, has the capacity to destroy entire planets, giving life across the globe to a new ecosystem, in which the former inhabitants are not to be found. Shinzon and the Remans tamed thalaron radiation, which instantly destroys all living tissue and can be used in controlled amounts and areas, and planned to destroy all life on earth with it. Kahn got away with detonating Genesis, but a heroic android prevents the use of the thalaron radiation. Which brings me to my next point...

3) Both required the sacrifice of the crew's inhuman pespective.

Spock, the logical half-Vulcan, sacrificed his life to manually repair the warp drive and dies speaking his last words to Kirk through the glass wall, soaking with radiation. Data the android jumped through space from the Enterprise to Shinzon's ship in order to beam the Captain back aboard the Enterprise and destroy the thalaron weapon before detonation. Both events leave you very discomforted at the end of the movie, but Spock is resurrected in Star Trek III: Search for Spock, and by mind melding with Bones before entering the radiation chamber, Spock leaves his mind in McCoy's to preserve it, and earlier in the movie Data transferred his memory banks to his older, incompetent brother B-4, who is in the Captain's care at the end of the movie. Sadly, though, with the newest Star Trek movie being a prequel involving the old guard, I don't see any resolution involving Data like that for Spock.

4) Both movies involve man's desires to harness the powers of God.

The Genesis project gave man the power of God to create worlds without number in one swift touch of a button. Shinzon, a clone of Captain Picard, represents the final day of creation, when God creates man in his own image. The latter of these was not done with good intentions. The cloning of Picard was done in a plot of Romulan trickery to take over the Federation. Picard points out, however, that although his life had made him a miserable, evil antagonist, Shinzon still had the capacity for good. It didn't take long for McCoy, upon learning the truth about the Genesis project, to criticize the destructive nature of the Genesis project. Kirk points out that in the wrong hands it could be used as a weapon, and Bones asks whose hands were wrong.

That's why the powers of God are God's. That's why the priesthood of God requires worthiness and faith of God. The powers of God are much too fragile for us to take lightly. The ill-advised use of his powers and trust carry with it the heaviest of consequences that can really hurt people. From the confidential obligations of a bishop to the financial matters of a clerk; from the way we take care of our bodies to the reactions of a missionary representative in confrontational situations; from the choosing a topic for a general conference talk, to choosing whether to honor powers of procreation meant to only be used in marital relationships. Imperfect, mortal men are not meant to create planets and life and dictate their actions for their own purposes. The powers of God are to be used to complete God's purposes by those he has chosen to empower. Not Sybok, in case you wondered.

That's my synopsis. It had some great action scenes. Picard's battering ram attack was very Kirk-esque, and was probably his best performance in military strategy in his whole Starfleet career.