Stalk Trek

I don't know whether you know or not, but there's a new little independent art house film coming out soon that's got a few folks a little bit excited. It's called Star Trek, and if you've been reading this blog since, well, it began, you'll know that I'm a wee bit excited about it.

OK, a lot excited about it.

OK, on the verge of needing to wear a man-nappy excited.

Does the term 'nerdgasm' mean anything to you?

Anyway, today was the UK premiere of Star Trek, and since all my efforts to get tickets to actually stroll down the red carpet and then watch the film with the celebs failed (despite lovely boss lady offering to buy me and my colleague in all things Star Trek tickets if we could find them - don't they know who I am!?), I had to make do with hanging out with the rest of the civilians safely cordoned off behind the barriers.

To be honest I was very blaise about the whole thing; I rocked up town just before six, then headed to Foyles to buy a book (The Lie by Chad Kultgen, if you're interested), at which point I almost had a go at the till monkey - first of all because he was monosyllabic and I actually like to hear people tell me how much cash they want me to fork over before I fork it over, and then because when I asked if I could have a bag to put it in he half-shoved it into one and then pushed it towards me. Outrageous! Put it in properly - isn't that what you're paid to do? I read a column by Mary Portas the other week where she criticized Foyles' staff and I tend to agree with her.

Where was I? Oh yes, Star Trek. So, after buying my book I strolled back to Leicester Square, met up with Marcosy, made a crack about how I hoped this Star Wars movie would be better than the last three (tee-hee - it's funny because it's a Star TREK movie!), and then stood behind a huge wall of tall people - and within mere minutes the stars began to arrive. Now, the last time I saw people at a film premiere was when I stumbled upon the X-Men 2 premiere a few years back. Somehow then I managed to get pretty close to the front and ended up seeing loads of stars. This time? Not quite so easy. I seriously think that at these sort of events the old school photo rule of thumb should come into play - y'know, tall people at the back, shorties at the front. We're all civilised, intelligent people, right? It shouldn't be too difficult to work out. As it was, I spent about half an hour on tippy-toes, and poor Marcosy saw practically nothing - because he's a midget.

Anyway, despite the hustle and bustle of the crowds and the inherent limitations of the iPhone's camera, I did manage to take a few not so bad pictures - and here's a selection of them just for you.

The Empire Leicester Square all decked out in Star Trek finery!

Here's director J.J. Abr- oh, it's the back of his head. Hmmm… J.J.! Turn around!

That's more like it. Here's director J.J. Abrams!

New Spock Zachary Quinto turns up. Sorry about the shaky-cam - I was really stretching for this one.

And here's new Kirk Chris Pine. I was very tempted to whack a massive arrow on this to point him out, but I can't be bothered. He's the dude in the suit standing side-on.

The lovely new Uhura, Zoe Saldana… (and, to the extreme right, a dude in a TNG era Starfleet uniform)

…And the new Dr. McCoy, Karl Urban (not to be confused with Mr Nicole Kidman, Keith Urban). Note also that Chris Pine is taking a photo of the crowd - yes, the new Kirk has a picture of my outstretched arm taking a picture of him; good times!

Here's another pic of J.J. - he was working the crowd good and proper.

The new Scotty, Simon Pegg, turned up in a kilt. I'm actually amazed how well this picture turned out because I just reached out and snapped it blind.

New Sulu, John Cho, was there too, but I didn't get a picture of him, perhaps because I was laughing too much at the guy behind me who kept saying "look - it's Harold from Harold and Kumar! What's Harold doing here? HAROLD!"

I also didn't see ex-Hulk Eric Bana, but I discovered later that I'd somehow snapped a pretty decent picture of him. This is what happens when you stand behind tall people and just wave your iPhone above your head like a mentalist.

Eric Bana plays the villain Nero in the new Star Trek movie. Don't make him angry - you wouldn't like him when he's angry!

All in all, then, a not too shabby effort. I'm glad I went - glad I got a chance to see the new stars of Star Trek even if it was from afar, and it was exciting for me - a Star Trek fan of 25-plus years, who has stuck with the franchise through the good times and the bad - to see a big crowd of everyday, non-Trekkie people hyped up about a new Star Trek movie. I was a little bit disappointed that the promoters didn't make the security guys wear red, though.

Anyway, to sum it up, I'm *really* excited about the movie now … Only 18 days to go!