'Star Trek' by way of beautiful teens and 'Top Gun'

Trek supernerds will need drool-catchers for this unbelievably comprehensive AICN post regarding the (praise Sybock!) aborted Starfleet Academy prequel. AICN’s new regular contributor Merrick, who has yet to prove himself as anything more than another codenamed Harry flack, doesn’t exactly make a great case for his ability as a judge of geek material. Although he admits that the thing reads like a “beautiful teens Top Gun” version of Star Trek (I'm waiting patiently for a Brokeback Star Trek parody) and quotes a couple of hideous, contrived, UPN-worthy bits of dialog, he gives the thing pretty strong praise. Here’s just one example he gives from the script:

STAR TREK: THE ACADEMY YEARS begins as TOS (movie) era McCoy addresses a Starfleet commencement. After his speech, several cadets corner the good doctor, who is standing alone, gazing into a reflecting pool. They nervously ask him about Kirk and Spock.

SECOND CADET: What were they like?

FIRST CADET: Were they friends?

McCOY: FRIENDS? I never met two less likely candidates for friendship in my entire life. That surprises you, doesn’t it? Well, it’s the gospel truth. They were as different as night and day. As Vulcan…and Iowa.

Pardon me, but any script that includes such blisteringly obvious, banal dialog doesn’t remotely deserve to be labeled “extremely involving,” “genuinely moving” or as having “a tremendously vibrant heart and soul.” Is it too much to ask for the gatekeepers of geekdom to actually be good geeks?