George Takei added to his ongoing feud with Star Trek co-star William Shatner by taking a cutting jab at his historic space flight.
At the opening of the Broadway show, Thoughts of a Colored Man, Takei lashed out at Shatner referring to him as a 90-year-old “guinea pig” to see space’s impact on an “unfit” specimen.
“So, 90-years-old is going to show a great deal more on the wear and tear on the human body, so he’ll be a good specimen to study,” 84-year-old Takei said, “Although he’s not the fittest specimen of 90-years-old, so he’ll be a specimen that’s unfit!”
“He’s boldly going where other people have gone before,” Takei said cuttingly when Page Six asked him what he thought of Captain Kirk’s brief trip to the edge of space.
In a statement responding to Page Six’s report about George Takei’s jabs, William Shatner speculated that his former co-star has a “psychosis” within him that forces him to go out of his way to denigrate him, even on such a happy occasion as his historic space flight. Shatner concluded that his one and only feeling toward Takei at this point is “pity.”
William Shatner and George Takei have been bickering back and forth with jabs at one another for decades, with most of the digs coming from Takei. It’s been well documented that the two actors did not get along well when they were working on the 1960s Star Trek: The Original Series, where they played Captain James T Kirk and Hikaru Sulu respectively.
Takei accused Shatner of ignoring him on the set and even changing the script for “Star Trek V” so Sulu, would not receive command of a spaceship.
During a 2018 Q&A, Shatner was asked if he wished Takei had died instead of Leonard Nimoy. “What a terrible question,” Shatner said, before adding, “Yes.” He later walked back the joke.
It must be said that George Takei isn’t the only one criticising William Shatner’s space flight. In an appearance on The Jonathan Ross Show on ITV Joan Collins said: “It’s amazing, isn’t it? What a fool. Who wants to do that? No, absolutely not. Did you see Bill Shatner?
“He was in the air and they were turning him upside down. Let’s take care of this planet first before we start going off.” Joan Collins appeared in an episode of the original series of Star Trek, playing a character called Edith Keeler who Captain Kirk, falls in love with but then allows to die.
In a BBC interview, Prince William criticised space tourism saying he has “absolutely no interest” in going to space, largely because there’s a “fundamental question” over the carbon cost of space flights.
“We need some of the world’s greatest brains and minds fixed on trying to repair this planet, not trying to find the next place to go and live,” the Duke of Cambridge told BBC Newscast’s Adam Fleming when asked what he thought of the ongoing billionaire space race and the hype of space tourism.
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