The 25 Baubles of Pop Culture! Advent 2022 Day 12

Today's Advent is boldly going where no holiday countdown has gone before- it's a look at the Christmas ornaments from the extremely popular sci-fi franchise, Star Trek.

While Star Wars beats the pants off of Star Trek in terms of quantity of ornaments sold by Hallmark, it's the latter franchise that predates the world of George Lucas. The first Star Trek ornament produced by Hallmark was released in 1992. It is a magic ornament representing the Shuttlecraft Galileo from the original series. When plugged into the Christmas lights on the tree, Trekkies could push a hidden button and hear a special holiday message from Mr. Spock himself! Yes, Hallmark managed to get Leonard Nimoy to record a voice-over. They must have paid him a buttload of cash to do it!

Two of my favorite ornaments produced from Hallmark are of a pair of obscure characters. The tri-armed Lt. Arex and feline Lt. M'ress were characters on the short-lived NBC Saturday morning cartoon version based on the original series. Producers wanted to include more alien characters onto the cartoon to make it more visually appealing to kids. This meant that Nichelle Nichols' Uhura, George Takei's Sulu and Walter Koening's Chekov were to be cut from the show. Seeing that both of Star Trek's ethnic characters weren't going to be a part of the cartoon, Leonard Nimoy went on strike. A deal was made and Uhura and Sulu were kept on the crew with M'ress trading duty of coms with Uhura. Arex slid over to Chekov's seat and Mr. Sulu remained as the helmsman. Don't feel too bad for Walter Koening, he was involved on the show in production as a script writer and story consultant.

Anyways, Arex and M'Ress were really awesome characters. Thus, I want to share this pair of 2018 Comic Con exclusives, which due to their limited release are currently valued at $160 for the set.

You can't talk about Star Trek ornaments from Hallmark without mentioning this piece from 2015. Consistently ranked as one of the strangest and most awkward ornaments in holiday history. This ornament depicts the death of Mr. Spock at the conclusion of Star Trek II: The Wraith of Khan. A great moment in sci-fi movie history. But a kinda weird choice for something to hang on your tree what with Spock's skin all burnt and peeling off...

From the DIY department, I bring you this crafty idea. Take your favorite photo of Captain Kirk from the original series, laminate it and stick it inside a plastic globe. Then add several miniature pom poms, preferably of earth tones (IRONIC!). Boom! Instant recreation of the penultimate scene from 'The Trouble With Tribbles!'

Lastly, let's look at the craft made realm of Star Trek decorations for sale on the internet. I chose this pair devoted to Star Trek: The Next Generation's Captain Jean-Luc Picard. First from a seller on Etsy is this laminated print of the good Captain wearing a Santa Cap and  getting ready to pronounce his trademark phrase 'Make It So.' To go with that is this wooden ornament found on Geekxgirls.com. It's a wooden ornament that makes a holiday pun of Picard's famous phrase by instead proclaiming 'Make It Snow.' HA! I love it!

Just like with Star Wars, I could devote an entire Advent to the ornaments of Star Trek. But it's gift giving time. In keeping with the theme of Captain Picard and his most famous phrase, here's a delightful video that someone made of dozens tiny clips of the character making it appear that Sir Patrick Stewart once sang this Trekkie version of Let It Snow.  It's lets that 3 minutes but really fun!

Enjoy!