Use of Tropes: Star Trek: Nemesis

2002 saw the release of director Stuart Baird’s Star Trek: Nemesis and, for some reason, it was one of the few Star Trek movies I never got around to watching. Later I told myself I had to, especially as Simon Bacon has identified it as a vampiric text.

Concentrating on the Romulans, the film has the Romulan Senate destroyed at the head of the film with a device that emits 'thalaron radiation' – a radiation so deadly that it consumes organic matter on a subatomic level – in film essentially turning the Senate to stone in seconds. Meanwhile, elsewhere, Riker (Jonathan Frakes) and Troi (Marina Sirtis, Castlevania: Hymn of Blood & Vampire Riderz) have got married and are being taken to Betazed when the Enterprise diverts having detected signs of an android like Data (Brent Spiner) eminating from a pre-warp planet, and again when sent on a diplomatic mission to Romulus.

Ron Perlman as the Viceroy

The new Praetor, a Reman named Shinzon (Tom Hardy) has reached out for peace but in reality it is a convoluted plan to get Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart, Lifeforce & Sinbad: the Fifth Voyage), in the first instance, and then destroy the Federation. The Reman are a slave caste from the planet Remus. Before we meet Shinzon we see his Viceroy (Ron Perlman, Cronos, Blade 2, Hellboy: Blood and Iron & I Sell the Dead). This is how the original screenplay for the film describes the Viceroy (in a scene not in the final edit): “He is a terrifying sight. A powerful, monstrous alien creature; a tall, ashen-skinned ectomorph who bears a disturbing resemblance to the original Nosferatu. He is vampiric and lethal. He is a Reman” This is the first trope, basing the Reman on the design of Orlock.

Tom Hardy as Shinzon

Shinzon is not, biologically, a Reman – rather he is a human and, it quickly transpires, a clone of Picard specifically designed to infiltrate the Federation in a subsequently abandoned plan. Sent to Reman to die in the dilithium mines, the cloning technique used “temporal RNA sequencing” which, when triggered, would rapidly age him to the requisite age for infiltration. Because it hadn’t been triggered Shinzon is dying as his cellular structure breaks down. The only way to save him is through “a complete myelodysplastic infusion from the only donor with compatible DNA.” That is Picard and he needs all of Picard’s blood to live – in other words he needs to drain Picard (we’ll ignore the fact that there should prove to be a non-deadly way of doing this in the futuristic setting).

dying for need of blood

This need for Picard's blood is our next vampiric trope and whilst there is only one possible victim, the draining blood to live is a fairly solid trope. The viceroy, we discover, is a psychic. I thought, as I watched the film, that his putting his hand on Shinzon’s chest when the clone is in pain was perhaps some temporary healing but, according to the script, it is “an ancient form of Reman telepathic medical diagnosis”. He does, however, invade Troi’s mind (when in coitus with Riker) making her see her husband as Shinzon and then himself. Troi, much like Mina in Dracula tracking the fleeing Count, is able to reverse that connection and pinpoint the Remans’ cloaked ship. Shinzon is killed by being impaled in the chest – making the antagonist’s death a staking of sorts.

And there you have it, lots of tropes – actually probably enough to call the film a vampire film but, if not, certainly of strong genre interest. The imdb page is here.

On DVD @ Amazon US

On Blu-Ray @ Amazon UK