The 10 Best Alternate Universes In Sci-Fi
Grow a goatee and blame it all on your evil counterpart.
The Universe Without George Kirk as seen in Star Trek (2009)
Star Trek was in trouble. Enterprise went out with a whimper and, for the first time in decades, there weren’t any new Star Trek episodes airing. Trek needed a transfusion — of fresh vision, of excitement, of vitality. Enter J.J. Abrams and screenwriters Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman. They took the ballsy course of rebooting a property with some of the most die-hard fans around, gambling that they could make a Trek movie not just for fans, but for people who had never cared about Star Trek. By dropping a pissed-off rogue Romulan back in time, they created an entirely new, alternate Trek timeline where Jim Kirk grew up without a father and where nothing can be taken for granted.
They put that mission statement front and center by destroying Vulcan, setting us up for a very different Trek universe in the future films. Best of all, by using Leonard Nimoy’s “Spock Prime” as a transition point between the two realities, they made it clear that the original timeline beloved by generations of fans is still just as valid as this new one. That allowed them to pacify rabid Trekkers while providing a new Trek playground, one where anything can happen. Trek 2 will determine how well Abrams and company make use of that freedom, but for the first time in a long time we don’t know where Trek is headed… and that’s a good thing.
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