With
all the talk I’ve done about Trek the last eight months, I still
haven’t said much about the Abrams movies that have come out the last
several years. They have done a great job of keeping the franchise
alive…though they have not been perfect.
In 2009 JJ Abrams shocked the world by rebooting Star Trek. Ok maybe
that’s a little over the top. It makes sense, the TV series had died out
and it was clear the Next Gen movies were a bust. So why not start
over? TNG was met with outrage when it came along but at least it didn’t
recast the main characters. This was even more crazy! But Abrams pulled
it off with excellent casting and a time paradox which gives us a new tine
line while not eliminating the old one. Of course one of the big reason
these movies were hits is because they reached a new fan base of young people who may have never
heard of Star Trek. While not perfect I can’t deny that these films are
keeping the franchise alive and well.
I asked my friend Les if he wanted to talk about it since he has more insight to the reboot movies and is a more devoted Trek fan than I.
RichB:Hello Les thanks for chatting with me today
LES: Hi RichB. Thanks for having me over to chat about ”Trek.”
RichB:I wanted to specifically talk about the latest film but it’s only fair to mention the two that came before it.
Star Trek (2009)
I hate we have to call it ”2009”, couldn’t they have used a surname? Anyway, I did a whole article on this when it came out so it’s easier just to link you to that. Have my thoughts changed since that article? Not really, while I admit to being nitpicky here and there for the most part I still say it was to much. It was basally ”What if Star Trek were turned into a Star Wars movie”. Check the article out here: http://nostalgiarush.blogspot.com/2012/03/five-things-i-hated-about-star-trek-2009.html
Les, before we get into the latest movie what did you think of the first?
Les:I really liked ”Star Trek(2009).” While there were some problems with it(the redesign of the Enterprise took me 2 films to warm up to, and the destruction of Vulcan pissed me off a bit….), the cast really captured the characters we’re all familiar with and love(Particularly Zachary Quinto(Spock), Karl Urban(McCoy), Simon Pegg(Scotty) and Bruce Greenwood(Pike….well, ok, many weren’t familiar with him, since he’s only in 2 episodes of TOS…but his take on the character was really good for predicting what he might’ve been given more screen time..but I digress…)). Additionally, having Leonard Nimoy reprise his role as Spock Prime gave the film a legitimacy to the canon.
RichB:Nimoy was a genius move and is what sold the movie. And destroying Vulcan was lame, just the creators bragging they could do whatever they wanted and would. However, while I had strong feelings about the first Trek movie the second was better, with one big exception.
Star Trek Into Darkness
I was really enjoying it, it was really feeling like a Star Trek movie and I liked it. Until that last twenty minutes. I’m sorry but there is a difference between an homage and just ripping something off. And that death scene of Kirk qualifies as a rip off of Spock’s death in TWOK. On top of that Khan was underused, the action scenes were still a bit dizzying, and And some of the fan service moments were real gratuitous (Carol Marcus in her underwear? Sure not). Anyway, again I already did an article on this one so it’s just easier for you to read what I already wrote. (If it seems formatted a little oddly it’s because it was written as a secret Santa blog swap that year). See it here : http://nostalgiarush.blogspot.com/2013/12/lets-talk-about-star-trekinto-darkness.html
Les, you’re thoughts one Darkness before we dive into the new one?
LES: ”Into Darkness” was a missed opportunity to forge a great story to set this cast’s signature for their own adventures…but stole too much of ”Star Trek II The Wrath of Khan” to qualify as such. Simply put: They didn’t need Benedict Cumberbatch to be Khan Noonien Singh….he was adequate a villain as John Harrison, a follower of Khan who is revived and goes renegade against the Federation. THAT would’ve been a smart film plot. As soon as he’s identified as Khan, the film lost all its credibility and jumped the shark. The best thing I can say about that film is it convinced me that the new ship WAS the Starship Enterprise, and not a horrible re-imagining of it designed poorly.
RichB:You’re right about that last part it did feel more like the Enterprise, it did nothing for me in the first film. Though the Bridge was and will continue to be way to silly.
Anyway, let’s get to the reason we’re here–Star Trek:Beyond (oh and I should mention, SPOILERS AHEAD!!)
Les: I saw it twice. Loved it.
Rich:I went to see Star Trek:Beyond at the theaters. As you may know I don’t do that often. The last movie I saw in a theater was Star Wars (weird). I was going to see Batman V Superman but the reviews scared me away. Thank goodness considering when I did finally watch it. So, what did I think of Beyond?
I liked it. I really, really liked it. While a part of me still has trouble accepting this reboot universe I can’t deny that this is a really good movie. Let’s try to go through the highlights, remembering I only saw it once so Les can clear up anything I missed. The main plot we see when the movie opens is Kirk frustrated at being captain on a long five year mission. Honestly this would have been dumb, except in the 2009 Trek the way Pike challenged Kirk to step up and be better than his father–yeah I can see how that would leave you feeling the way he does in this movie. Besides with these films any character development is good development! And any good movie knows you need an arc for the main character. I also liked seeing life aboard the Enterprise since we obviously never saw any of this five year mission (first few minutes of this movie aside). Great gags here too like Kirk’s ripped shirt and he has a great line about it feeling ”episodic”.
Les, Kirk’s ”crisis” in this movie-forced or natural for the character?
LES: Well, to put it simply, Chris Pine finally convinced me that he was Captain Kirk in this film….and a lot of that was the way he confronted his fears about being the Captain, in much the same way Shatner did in several great TOS episodes(”This side of Paradise,””The Ultimate Computer,””The Guardian of Forever,””The Naked Time,””Mirror, Mirror,” etc.). When he put his crew ahead of himself in this film, I believed it. That was how far his character had matured…as it would’ve done after 3 years in uncharted space.
RichB:Kirk has matured even when he rides the motorcycle later in the movie you can tell it isn’t the same youth as in the start of that first movie. My favorite scene was when the Enterprise was crashing down, and the look of Kirk’s reflection as he watched the ship crash was, I thought, very nice. We never got the same ”I love the Enterprise” feel from this KIrk like we did in the series so that scene, while brief, was done beautifully.
The action was really great too. It didn’t get as crazy as it did in the first movie. Speaking of the Enterprise getting destroyed (no spoiler it was in the trailer), it’s handled well and it didn’t bother me too much since the Enterprise in these movies has never been a character the way it was in the original series and movies. The scene was the only time that it felt the the other two movies in terms of fast paced, dizzying action but at least I knew what was going on.
LES: Yeah, the destruction of the Enterprise was just as epic as the one in ”Star Trek III The Search for Spock.” I also really love how Kirk managed to get one more action out of the saucer section after it crashed to fight the bad guys in a very epic way. Additionally, I really love how he did it with Ensign Chekov’s help(RIP Anton Yelchin….).
Rich:You’re so right about that. In fact one of my complaints from the first two movies was Chekov (no offense to the fine late actor) but here he really fit in and it was fantastic. In fact all of the characters were fantastic, everyone had something to and even a few good lines. Uhura and Sulu has just as much to do as the others which was great. And love Simon Peg’s Scotty more with every film. And I hated him in the first movie. I especially loved how they all worked together to come up with the answers, it was a collaboration you just didn’t see that much in the original series (and movies). I skipped over the B story which involved Spock learning that Spock Prime had died, Not only was this a touching was to remember Leonard Nimoy, but it was a realistic dilemma for the character Spock that worked.
LES: Absolutely. Having the photo of Prime Universe Enterprise bridge crew in Spock Prime’s belongings at the end of the film was a fantastic tribute to the late Leonard Nimoy and to the original cast. I also love the McCoy/Spock story in this film. It was worthy of the classic kind of McCoy/Spock interactions in TOS. I also love how they handled the Spock/Uhura relationship in a far more realistic way the third time around.
McCoy: ”You put a tracker on your girlfriend?”
Spock: *pause to consider….”That was not my intention….” LMAO!
RichB:That photo was absolutely beautiful. There were all kinds of great lines and homages, like McCoy doing a ”I’m a doctor not a…” bit and Chekov giving Russia credit for inventing Scotch, I am also happy to see that this movie has learned the different between an ”homage” and just flat out ripping something off. I think I saw homages that reminded me of all the films here, but it wasn’t just copying what that film had done there was something unique to it that made it special to ”Beyond” How many references did you get?
LES: Hmmmm…let’s see….
You listed 2 I got already-Chekov and McCoy…also…
The USS Franklin being an NX class starship was a nod to ”Star Trek Enterprise.”
McCoy’s pep talk with Kirk over Chekov’s scotch was very similar to McCoy’s pep talk with Kirk over Romulan Ale in ”Star Trek II The Wrath of Khan.” And it was done very well.
The ”Discordant noise” they use to neutralize the swarm drones in the climax is the same Beastie Boys song, ”Sabotage,” that 9 year old Kirk was blasting on the radio of his step Father’s corvette he ripped off in ”Star Trek(2009).”
The number of days they’d been on the 5 year mission, 966…or, 9/66(September of 1966…the month and year of the first episode of Star Trek aired on television and the birth of the franchise). Also, as it’s the end of the 3rd year of the mission, this story can be seen as the continuation of what could’ve been had NBC not cancelled the original show.
That’s just off the top of my head….
RichB:Let’s see Scotty mentions a green hand grabbing them which came from the episode ”Who Mourns for Adonais”, the rock and roll music was similar to First Contact, the ship landing in the water reminded me of Star Trek IV, the crash of the Enterprise was reminiscent to the one in Generations, docking with spacedock was like Star Trek III, at the spacedock there was a reference to Picard’s ship The Stragazer, and the uniform Kirk wears at the end is very similar to the gray uniforms worn in the first movie. Speaking of the U.S.S. Franklin and the nod to Enterprise, why is Star Trek Enterprise the only show still in canon? It certainly shows in this movie, which is kind of cool. Be cooler if I liked Enterprise, but whatever. They did a great job with The Franklin it was a really cool ship.
So there were only three new characters worth mentioning. Krall was the main villain and the best so far of the three (Khan was woefully underused and Nero was boring). At first he felt stock and boring, but as the movie went on and we learned his backstory (no spoiling) he got better and better. There was Kalara whose ending was a bit to fast in my opinion. The one new character we got that I loved was Jaylah, who is a really awesome character. We didn’t learn that much about her (I guess her backstory was deleted) but she really kicked ass. I like that she got along with Kirk but they weren’t flat out making out by the end,. By the way hat happened to Carol Marcus from the previous film? Actually they didn’t use when they realize there was nothing for her to do, kudos for that. What did you think of our new characters?
LES: I agree with you that Krall was the villain we’d been hoping for all along. He wasn’t obvious at first seeming like a stock alien bad guy….but as he develops, is given an amazing backstory and motivation for why he’s doing what he’s doing. WELL DONE, Simon Pegg(one of the script writers for this…). The second alien with the Xenomorph parasite legs hair…was mostly forgettable…and HELL YEAH, Jaylah was awesome. I’m really hoping they bring her back to fill the position left behind by the absence of Mr. Chekov(as it’s been confirmed that they will not be recasting his role).
RichB:So any complaints at all? Oh sure there always some. The villain was good, but I am not sure his backstory was explained enough. I mean we know where he came from but how did he develop those powers? I get they came from the natives of the planet they were on, but how? And there were some plot contrivances to make things work with the Enterprise and the Franklin (long story short they rescue the vessel and use it) which can be head scratching how they could do these things- but heck the original series had that too (remember The Naked Time and how Kirk asked Scotty to do something totally impossible, and he did it?).
Anything you didn’t like in the movie?
Les:Well…the re-used scene from ”Into Darkness” where the Enterprise is plummeting through the clouds at freefall speed and then miraculously is saved offscreen by it’s thrusters to float back through the clouds and into view again….was almost identical to the way they launch the USS Franklin….same camera angle too….”OOOOOH….looks like they’re gonna hit the ground spectacularly…and WHOOOOOSH! the ship zips by the screen like freakin’ Superman…..that has been done to death in the rebooted series IMHO.
Also…I don’t approve the decision to make Mr. Sulu gay in this. For the record, I don’t have any problems with gay characters in Star Trek(or any series for that matter), but Mr. Sulu wasn’t gay in the original timeline(or Sulu Prime). Claiming that changing the timeline with Nero’s intervention with the USS Kelvin in ”Star Trek(2009)” changed Sulu’s sexual orientation is ludicrous. You are born gay or straight. Environmental influences don’t determine your sexual orientation-PERIOD! George Takei(the original Sulu), who is gay in his real life, went on record against the decision to make Sulu a gay character, and I’m on his side for this one.
RichB:Good call on the first part that had been done before and they could have come up with something more original., As for the Sulu thing, I guess you could say that was some sort of fan service but changing something fundamental about a well established character just to please the fans is hard to justify. It’s like making Kirk a woman to make women happy or something.
So I don’t want to give away the whole story so I will just say that the movie flows very well. The crew is separated and have to find each other and defeat the bad guy, and while there are some coincidences (how the hell did Kirk and Scotty find Spock and McCoy exactly?) for the most part it was very well done. The climax was satisfying and I also loved the final scene, it was a great scene with all the characters together. I had the very end of the movie ruined for me by the jerk sitting in my row (I mean you couldn’t wait another minute to jump up and stand in front of me dumbass??) but it ended with the best nod to Star Trek you could end on and was fabulous. You know I will be seeing this again. And you know what, I really want to see this again it was a great film and I am so happy I broke down and saw it in theaters.
Les, any final thoughts on the movie?
LES: The only other thing I want to say is Paramount really fucked up with the advertising and promotion of this film. The trailer was horribly done and didn’t represent how great the film really was. When I saw the trailer, I was turned off…I’m serious. It looked like Michael Bay’s Star Trek…all explosions, babes and no story or good characters. I’m willing to bet this film lost a potential $700 million in box office sales just from the trailer…and that’s a damned shame. This film was very much worthy of the 50th anniversary of the franchise. It deserved massive box office sales and a strong showing to justify the next film in the series. This film respects the legacy of the franchise and gives the ”Trekers” the film they’ve been yearning for…and they probably didn’t go and see it thanks to a lackluster advertising campaign.
Pssst!…hey Trekkies…GO SEE THIS! IT’S GREAT!!!!!!
RichB :Oh my god I know! The trailer was awful and while stuff in the trailer is in the movie, the rock music and motorcycle stuff actually works in the film very well the way it ’s used. I just watched the trailer again, and wow. Funny, people thought after the trailers this would be a dud and Suicide Squad would be the hit. They were right about Ghostbusters though. By the way I saw this as the movie is cycling out theatres and there were plenty there so I think word of mouth has gotten people scared by the trailers in to see this movie. I even heard someone laughing at some parts.
Wjy not? This movie is fantastic and if you haven’t seen it yet, see it. It’s a great movie and a fitting way to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Star Trek!!!
Thanks for helping me with this Les, peace and long life my friend
LES: It’s been a pleasure to discuss this wonderful Trek adventure with you, my friend. Live long and prosper(RIP Leonard Nimoy).
Thanks for reading my friends I’ll be back with more as we get closer and closer to Star Trek’s official anniversary date
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