Treknobabble is a continuing series of columns written by uber-Trekkie Reed Farrington in anticipation of the upcoming J.J. Abrams Star Trek movie.

If your knowledge of Star Trek is limited to pointy ears, the phrase “Beam me up, Scotty”, Klingons, and/or the Borg, then I’m going to prepare you for the upcoming Star Trek film.

Perhaps I should take a short diversion to define a Trekkie. (People like labels in order to categorize things. That’s how our minds work.) I know there’s a negative connotation in Star Trek fandom to being called a Trekkie. For the purposes of this article, I’m going to define a Trekkie as someone who appreciates Star Trek and can’t get enough of it.

I must tell you that this is the first Treknobabble article that I’ve completely rewritten after the first attempt, because my first draft was just cruel and unfunny, based on the well-worn stereotypes. Stuff like, first of all, you need to move into your mother’s basement.

You know how it’s only okay for black people to call each other the n-word, but it’s offensive if a non-black person calls a black person the n-word? Well, the same doesn’t apply for geeks, even though the malice behind a non-geek calling someone a “geek” is the same. Black people get more respect than geeks. Geeks can’t get into the cool nightclubs. Imagine life as a black geek. (Yes, they do exist.) A Trekkie calling someone else a “geek” is just pathetic. And I don’t want to be pathetic.

Now let’s pretend that for whatever reason, you want to become a Trekkie. (I know that it takes a huge stretch of the imagination to start with this premise given the stigma attached to being a Trekkie, given that being a Trekkie offers no benefits in the real world.) Where do we begin?

How about intelligence? If you didn’t graduate from high school, should you give up trying to be a Trekkie and instead get a membership with the Star Wars Fan Club? (Someone is going to beat me over the head with his light saber.) One misconception about Star Trek is that you need to have some intelligence in order to understand it. I can guarantee that Stephen Hawking would scratch his head (oh, wait, can Stephen Hawking scratch his own head?) at some of the “treknobabble” used in the later series. The best Star Trek deals with simple ideas and how humans react. We can all relate.

I don’t think it would be hard for someone to understand what Star Trek’s technology does when seeing it for the first time. A transporter gets you from here to there. The Starship Enterprise is like a car with an engine that overheats a lot. A phaser is like a gun that has different settings. A tricorder tells you information such as how many people are around you, even the people you can’t see. A hypospray injects you with medicine without a needle. A replicator makes stuff. The technology hasn’t changed much over all the series. And don’t worry about all the new words. When you see the thing or see what it does, you don’t need to know its name. I think the only new thing since the Original Series is the holodeck. A holodeck is a room that makes you think you’re somewhere else. If you’re asking yourself how that works, you’re starting to become a Trekkie. (How many people actually understand how a television works? I mean, how many people could build a television from scratch?)

But beyond the scientific concepts explored, one also has to contend with the massive historical background that this fictional universe has accumulated over 40 years. In the Original Series, each episode could practically stand alone. So basically you could watch the episodes in any order. Some have attributed the success of Star Trek in syndication to this strategy. What we ended up with were stories heavily driven by plot. Unfortunately, this also meant that the characters wouldn’t change. All of television at the time was structured like this.

Beginning with series like Hill Street Blues, more prime-time television became soap opera like. The later Star Trek series resisted this, but eventually Deep Space Nine (probably in response to Babylon 5) and Enterprise (in response to poor ratings) used story arcs. So it’s probably a good idea to avoid Deep Space Nine and Enterprise episodes for your first taste of Star Trek.

I would think that many people who have seen the movie, Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan, have never seen the Original Series episode “Space Seed” upon which the movie was based. I don’t think it’s necessary to have seen it, but those who have, surely have a better appreciation for the movie. So you don’t have to know the history, but you’ll be missing out on all the nuances that make life worth living.

Star Trek tends to repeat itself a lot. Especially the Original Series. That’s why there are so many catch phrases and peculiarities that people have picked up on. Dr. McCoy says, “He’s dead, Jim,” a lot as well as “I’m a doctor, not a .” People with red shirts on landing parties tend to get killed a lot. Capt. Kirk has his flying drop kick. Capt. Kirk destroys computers by talking them to death. If there’s a woman guest star, then chances are Kirk will lock lips with her. Spock has his “Live Long and Prosper” greeting, and his Vulcan nerve pinch. There are musical themes for jeopardy, fighting, romance, alien worlds, etc. So as you watch more episodes, you will find that it’s quite comforting to adventure with a family of characters on screen.

You might think you don’t have time to try to understand Star Trek before seeing J.J. Abrams’ version. Believe me, despite what Abrams and his cohorts would like you to believe, you will need to understand Star Trek in order to appreciate the movie. And you still have a whole year to catch up! I could even list some of the most popular episodes for you to download or rent. I once thought that if anyone sat down to watch “City on the Edge of Forever,” then he/she would immediately become a fan. But a friend who had seen the episode assured me that he was not a Trekkie. This episode speaks to me, because (SPOILER ALERT!) Kirk has to sacrifice the life of a loved one in order to literally set the world right. And in order to allow the sacrifice to occur, he has to physically hold one of his best friends and prevent him from saving her! It’s not enough to stand idly by.

In the book Living with Star Trek: American Culture and the Star Trek Universe, the author cites a fan letter from someone who got into Star Trek by watching the Next Generation episode, “Pen Pals”, in which an alien girl transmits a message for help that a crew member of the Enterprise intercepts and decides to take action even though he is disobeying the rules of alien contact. The letter writer says, “(the episode) captured my feelings at the time perfectly: a lone voice crying out into the void, desperate for someone to listen to it.” The reason I bring this example up is that I think any episode of Star Trek could potentially make anyone into a Trekkie.

Remember when I said that “being a Trekkie offers no benefits in the real world”? I should say that being a Trekkie does offer happiness when you’re alone. There’s a stereotype of a Trekkie being a non-popular outsider. But poets have always known that each and everyone of us is born alone and dies alone. If you’re feeling sad and lonely one day, then tune in to any episode of any Star Trek series, and you will see people caring for one another as they head out into the unknown. As we orbit the Sun on spaceship Earth, we are all potentially Trekkies.