I am not bothered by the inconsistent look of the new Klingons, any more than I was bothered by the inconsistent look of certain models and special effects as the franchise moved from ’60s TV to post STAR-WARS movie screens and back to TV and back to movies again. Any more than I am bothered by the primitive look of the original series, when I go back to it again.

My head-canon for badly aged special effects has always been that we are seeing a representation, anyway. A compromise between what they wanted to show and what could be shown. When the movies introduced the new-look ridgy-forehead Klingons, I had absolutely no difficulty saying to myself, “Okay, they always looked that way; the show just didn’t have the budget to provide it.”

Similarly, I have no problem with saying of the new guys, “This is just another interpretation of the aliens we have seen multiple times before, filtered through different sfx technology.”

I certainly didn’t need a separate storyline “explaining” it, but then, I guess many STAR TREK fans are imagination-deprived. (This is a sad fact. Not worth arguing.)

See, one reason I never had any problem with any of this is that part of my education in watching drama involved stage plays and very old movies. Watching DEATH OF A SALESMAN on the stage, I never had any difficulty buying that the simple outline wood frame dictated by the text was an actual house, any more than I have had any problem buying that two actors sitting side by side on a little bench, one miming manipulation of a steering wheel, were in a car. I like great special effects as much as the next guy, but when stories work, I have never been knocked back to reality by a bad matte line, or an obvious painted backdrop, or a zipper running up a monster’s back, the way that some of today’s viewers rebel at even slightly-less-than-optimum CGI. I never thought the world of STAR TREK looked like the TV representation of STAR TREK, ever. But I could make that leap. Just as I could make the leap that the original, jerky clay beast known as King Kong was a giant gorilla.

I wish more of us weren’t fixated on visual perfection.

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