WARNING --- THE FOLLOWING POST ENDED UP BEING MUCH LONGER THAN I ORIGINALLY ENDED -- READ AT YOUR OWN PERIL
Dear lord. Um. I knew it was gonna be dumbed down -- but really? Really? Sweet Jesus.
Ohkay, I'll start with the positives? Right? Positives...
The score was good. I actually really liked the new theme.
On the other hand, the Beastie Boys was RETARDED and the "OMG THIS IS SERIOUS!" choir and villain music was completely hamfisted.
The movie looks great. I loved the costumes. This was the best Starfleet uniforms have ever looked. I loved the sound effects.
On the other hand, the set design is practically nonsensical. The bridge of the Enterprise, while clearly it's own deck on the outside, is also clearly on the same level as many other rooms in the interior. The engineering areas not only do not look like the same ship, they don't look like any ship. They don't even look functional. Nero's ship falls prey to questions like "why is it full of bottomless holes and why are there no railings on any of this dangerous walkways over the bottomless hole?"
Hrrmm --- this isn't going well...
Okay, the cinematography. Well -- this is the best looking Star Trek movie, ever. Paramount finally decided to put some money into things. But while the costumes and the bridge look great, I really wish I had more of a chance to see them because Abrams keeps pointing flashlights at me and swinging the camera around wildly so I never get a good look at where all the money is going.
Every time there was an action sequence I had to strain to figure out what was happening because the staging, cinematography, and editing was so haphazardly done.
It's a bad sign when the first shot of the movie is so completely disorienting that I have no idea what's going on for a good minute.
Kay, positives, right -- let's try again --
The cast. Okay. I'm gonna go down the IMDB list. Chris Pine was surprisingly good as Kirk. Not strong enough to lead the cast, mind you, but much better than I expected. He has all the swagger Kirk needs, without aping Shatner. Zachary Quinto on the other hand, let me down as Spock. He's got all the inner turmoil, but he comes off as a huge prick the entire movie. Leonard Nimoy's scenes are golden. He's given some of the worst lines in the movie, but he sells it because he's the only real actor in this cast. Anybody could've played Nero -- the role is barely there and hardly interesting. Bruce Greenwood is the strongest member of the new cast as Captain Pike -- he really grounded the film and made things seem at least somewhat plausible when he said them. Karl Urban was great as McCoy, just great, and I wish he could've been used more. Zoe Saldana had a quiet grace and confidence as Uhura that I liked. Simon Pegg was hilarious as Scotty, but severely underused. John Cho was great as Sulu. And Bong was absolutely right -- Anton Yelchin steals the show as Chekov and makes the most out of every line he's got. Good on him.
Probably the weakest members of the cast are Winona Ryder and Ben Cross as Spock's parents. Ryder never really gets me to care enough about Amanda so when the moment comes it has no impact. Ben Cross isn't so much terrible, as he's up against Mark Lenard -- so yeah, he's terrible.
So the movie looks great, the score's good, it's competently acted -- what's the problem? It's retarded. The story just had far too many contrivances for me to buy it. And also it basically takes the "sci" right out of "sci-fi" and replaces it with lens flare. (Previous statement open for pithy quotation)
Okay, okay. Screw this. I can't organize this properly so here's how it's gonna be -- stream of consciousness: from one end of the movie to another, my thoughts and nitpicks as we go. If you want a more coherent review, go read my other one in the other thread. Also -- spoilers ahead. Sorry, can't really do it otherwise. So don't say I didn't warn you.
So a bunch of other reviewers have single out the opening sequence as an emotional sucker-punch that immediately draws you into the film. I respectfully disagree. Two reasons this sequence did not work for me at all. One was that I'm being asked to care about characters who I know nothing about. Basically my only connection to George Kirk is that he's James Tiberius' father. So what? I don't care. I never get to know these characters, so I don't care when they all die.
My second reason is a nitpick:
Why is Winona Kirk on the USS Kelvin? I'm sorry, but the writers must be as ignorant to the workings of biology as they are to physics. Pregnancy isn't some sudden thing that comes on so quick you don't have time to process it. If a female officer onboard a Starfleet vessel got pregnant she would be off on maternity leave within three months. No way would a nine-months pregnant woman be on a border-patrol scout ship. And don't tell me she's a civilian, because Starfleet didn't start carrying families aboard until about 230 years later. That was my first facepalm of the movie, it was stupid.
A belated facepalm was the appearance of Nero on the Kelvin viewscreen. Why does the Captain of the Kelvin recognize Nero as a Romulan? Humans have never seen a Romulan at this point. The Captain should be like "WTF? A Vulcan?" Pay attention to this facepalm, I'll be bringing it up later.
Time for a fan nitpick -- In Gene Roddenberry's novelization of The Motion Picture, he states the following explanation of James T. Kirk's name: "James" for his uncle (brother of his father, George Samuel Kirk, Sr) and "Tiberius" for the Roman Emperor, who had always fascinated his grandfather, Samuel Kirk. Why the fascination? Because "Tiberius" was a successful general who became a ruthless and terrible emperor, and Kirk's grandfather liked the lesson of "stick with what you're good at". Kirk later used his middle name of a reminder of how easy it is to lose compassion in a position of command.
Okay, sounds good, right?
In this movie, it's "James" after his mother's father and "Tiberius" after his father's father. Yawn/facepalm.
At least they got his year of birth right -- 2233.
We hit one of the story's biggest head scratchers. Nero, our big planet destroying villain, then sits around doing nothing for 25 years. He claims later that he was plotting his revenge, but his plot turns out to be destroy every planet in the Federation. Christ, took him 25 years to come up with that? Gonna take him a while, too. He should've spent the 25 years getting a head start.
Anyways, after the main titles we get the "Corvette" scene. Why the **** is this in the movie? We get a *hint* of Kirk's abusive uncle (but not really) and all this scene does is establish Kirk as a troublemaker -- oh, and makes no sense. We've got the STUPID Beastie Boys song, as well as the 1957 Corvette with 23rd century Nokia radio. Kirk's uncle says its an "antique" -- DUDE IT'S 300 YEARS OLD!!! A farmer in Iowa owning a 300 year old car is like a farmer today owning a 1700s era ANYTHING -- improbable as ****. And in working condition? And young Kirk can drive it?? Most 12-year-olds NOW can't drive a stick shift off-the-cuff and cars are something we're familiar with! FACEPALM.
Next up -- some Vulcan stuff with young Spock. To be honest, the early Vulcan stuff with Spock is great. Well written, well done. The only weaknesses are Ryder as Amanda and Cross as Sarek. They both suck. Oh, and the LUDICROUS dutch angle intro to the Vulcan Science Council scene -- I mean, whaaat? It also would've been nice to get a bit of conflict between Spock and Sarek over Spock's infamous choice to join Starfleet -- after all, this is what supposedly severs their relationship as father and son (hint: this is handled way better in Shatner's book, Collision Course
) Still, the Kolinahr and katric arks references were cool.Cut to Iowa bar scene. The film starts falling apart.
I'm gonna address something right here and now. The character ages make no sense. I made this realization months ago, I'm gonna spell it out now --
The film takes place in 2258 -- it's established that Kirk joins Starfleet three years earlier, in 2255. This would mean he joined five years later than in the standard timeline, where his academy days were 2250-54. It also means he's about 25 in this movie. Okay. Based on that -- Uhura should be 19 (meaning she should be 16 when we first see her in the bar), Sulu should be 21, and Chekov should be 13 (he explicitly says he's 17 in the movie). Sorry, Nero blowing up the Kelvin in 2233 does not change the ages of the characters. But never mind, I made that point months ago and there's still more plot holes to go.
Okay, my question -- why are a bunch of Academy cadets spending their leave time in a bar in the middle of nowhere in Riverside, Iowa?? The Academy is in San Francisco -- are there no more nightspots on the western seaboard? And why is Captain Pike with them?
Oh. Right. So the movie can contrive a reason for Kirk to meet Uhura and subsequently meet Pike.
This is called BAD WRITING.
"The Riverside shipyards" says Pike. Riiiiight. That are building one ship only. Which ship is being built in Riverside in the year 2255?
The one built in San Francisco in 2245 you say? Well, then!
Okay, so Nero's time meddling for some reason delayed the Enterprise's construction by ten years. Seems that in this timeline, "The Cage" (Roddenberry's original Star Trek story) NEVER HAPPENED, since it was set aboard the Enterprise in 2254, a full year before it was built in this film.
Ahem. Anyways. Jesus this post is going to be loooong. I apologize.
I liked the scene where Kirk gets on the shuttle to go to the Academy (though I totally called the scene where he gives his motorcycle to some dude). The Kirk/McCoy interaction was great, and I liked the friendship that the film developed between them. I also liked the acknowledgement that McCoy's older than Kirk, and the recognition of his failed marriage. It's weird that the film followed canon in some respects, and disregarded it completely in others.
Then we flash forward three years. To me this was a big wasted opportunity -- promised a movie about the beginnings of Kirk and Spock, we really get neither.
One of the funny things about this movie is that it's clear intention is to get people who've never seen a Star Trek to get into the franchise. Yet they do a **** job of explaining anything to the uninitiated. If I knew nothing about Star Trek -- okay, you briefly give me Starfleet and the Federation --- but who are the Klingons? The Romulans? The Romulans are the main villains, yet if I was a newbie watching the movie I'd wonder -- wait, why do these guys look exactly the same as Vulcans. It's about an hour and a half into the movie that Spock finally says "Romulans and Vulcans share a common ancestor".
A smart writer might've taken advantage of the Academy setting to throw in a "history class" expository scene where we set up that the Romulans were offshoots of the Vulcans who left when the Vulcans imposed their philosophy of logic. This would not only explain our villains, but also help new audience members understand why Vulcans lack, yet still have, emotions.
Anyways, instead we get Kirk cheating on the Kobayashi Maru test. Which was fun, and cool, but IMO a little too obvious. I always got the impression it was a bit more of a devious cheat that this OBVIOUS haxors move. Still a fun scene, only taken down by the mention of the "USS Kobayashi Maru."
It's a freighter, not a Starfleet vessel. Therefore "SS Kobayashi Maru", not "USS".
Am I going to nitpick every last detail of this movie?
Well I'm going to sure as hell try. What else have you been waiting for?
The detail that Spock programmed the test is neat, but I don't think necessarily what the writers of TWOK had in mind when they said he never took the test.
The movie almost starts talking about some themes like fear and emotion and no-win scenarios, but then it remembers that **** like that is totally lamzorz and where's all the explosions?
So we begin the first instance of what is clearly the writers complete and utter lack of understanding what the word "verisimilitude" means -- or even the beginnings of how things like "chain-of-command" work.
Turns out that Vulcan is being threatened and because the ENTIRE STARFLEET is all in the Laurentian System (named after the pencil crayons, no doubt), the Cadets of Starfleet Academy are all being pressed into service into the ships in Earth orbit (which are presumably on "defend the **** out of Earth" duty).
Okay --- so I know this is the new film's version of "you're the only ship in the area", but still -- WHAT THE FLYING ****?? Um, no. The entire **** Starfleet is NOT in one **** system. The film NEVER EVER EVER adequately answers the question of WHY all of Starfleet is off in the Laurentian System, it just sticks them there for the ENTIRE MOVIE.
Soooo -- all our cadets are pressed into service. Vulcan is a major planet, one of the five founders of the Federation. Does it not have some ships of it's own? Is there no ships in the Vulcan area that can help with the evacuation?? *sigh*
So next thing we know (after some hijinks) we get all our friends onboard the Enterprise. Spock is the first officer to Pike (Number One does not exist in this timeline, evidently), while our cadets are all commissioned into their original series ranks except Kirk, who's on academic suspension for cheating and McCoy sneaks on in order to facillitate the Nutty Professor swollen hands gag that's completely pointless.
And hello! There's 13 -- ahem -- I mean 17 year old Chekov as our navigator. This begins the writers complete lack of understanding of shipboard positions. At this point in the movie Chekov issues a shipwide communique about the mission (usually Uhura's job) while later in the film Uhura gives Spock bearing and heading info on Nero's ship (logically Chekov's job). Later Sulu asks Chekov to allocate him certain amounts of power at certain points for precision maneuvers (usually Scotty's job). Facepalm.
Chekov's main role in the film is to have a funny accent. It's charming, it's funny, but man is it overplayed. Walter Koenig never layed it on that thick.
Turns out Sulu's here because the regular helmsman is sick with the flu. No jokes.
Uhura gets promoted to senior communications officer when it turns out the perfectly qualified experienced officer in the post can't tell Romulan from Vulcan.
McCoy becomes the doctor because the original doctor is killed in Nero's attack. (Boyce? Noooooooo!) Still, the Chapel reference was HIGHLY appreciated (again, schizophrenic canon adherence).
So the Enterprise arrives at Vulcan, despite Cadet Kirk warning --
and the entire cadet-manned fleet is instantly destroyed by Nero's mining ship's superior 24th century technology. Well, except the Enterprise of course.
Her transporters get taken out (good! an explanation!) so Kirk, Sulu, and Ensign Expendable get choosen by Pike to skydive to Nero's planet destroying drill to destroy it while Pike goes to reason with Nero. Two important things -- Ensign Expendable not only dies a classic redshirt death, but actually was the Enterprise's chief engineer, Lt. Cmdr. Olsen. That'll be important later, when Simon Pegg decides to show up.
Oh, and as Pike's leaving he declares Spock to be Acting Captain and Kirk to be Acting First Officer. Other than the fact that promoting a suspended cadet to First Officer makes no sense, okay fine. Remember this -- it becomes important.
So Kirk and Sulu get a cool action scene fighting Romulan baddies who pop out of hatches in the floor of the drill (why? so we can have an action scene, of course!!), while Pike gets swiftly captured and Spock uttterly fails to save his planet.
The planet Vulcan and all its inhabitants die a redshirt death. Spock briefly muses on the genocide of his entire race in his log, but the impact of this is largely glossed over. Except for when the film finds it convenient.
Like the first massive WTF moment. Spock goes into a turbolift shaft to brood. Good so far. Uhura follows him. Okay. Uhura comforts him on the loss of his race. Okay. She does this by frenching him. Repeatedly. Which Spock totally goes along with.
Kay, WHAAAT??? Where did this come from? The movie completely springs this on us as if its normal. It's not. Seeing Spock and Uhura make out is as weird as seeing my parents make out.
Don't worry -- it's never explained or developed. It also becomes Uhura's sole role in the movie from here on out.
Spock decides that this is all Kirk's fault. Kirk wants to chase Nero to Earth, while Spock wants to rendezvous with the fleet in the Pencil Crayon System. No one thinks of hailing the fleet and saying "YO DAWG! MOBILIZE EVERYTHING!! GET TO EARTH! MEET YOU THERE!!!"
For doing the job of a First Officer and questioning the Captain, Kirk is summarily exiled by Spock to Delta Vega.
Hmmmm -- they happened to pass by a planet that is less than a day (on impulse) away from the edge of the galaxy (1,000 light years from Earth) while on their way between Vulcan (16 light years from Earth) and Earth itself. Facepalm.
After running from monsters, Kirk runs into NimoySpock, who was exiled there by Nero, and Scotty, who was exiled there by Starfleet.
Delta Vega -- your one-stop out of the way spot for exiles.
Nimoy nearly saves the film. His performance is touching and really gets to you. Too bad he's required to give the exposition necessary to explain the FUBAR of a plot. Supernovas cannot expand and threaten the galaxy. Why is it Ambassador Spock who volunteers to save Romulus with a black hole? How is it that Romulus is suddenly destroyed with no warning? Supernovas are not sudden things that come out of nowhere.
Black holes do not equal time travel. (Nevermind that the black hole is inconsistent -- one moment it equals time travel, the next -- destruction!)
Now, Star Trek has always played fast and loose with science, but at least it's always respected the basics, respected the ideals and the principles, and when breaking it always tried to come up with a halfway decent bullsh*t explanation.
But no, this just shows that the writers really had no desire to do any homework to make their plot.
But again, like every other implausible thing in this script, this is dealt with quickly and not elaborated on -- we're meant to forget it and move on.
I would say this was the point when the film lost my suspension of disbelief.
Spock Prime convinces Kirk that being in command of the Enterprise is important and gives Scotty some advanced future knowledge that helps them beam to the Enterprise. Scotty ends up in a water pipe and "hilarity" ensues.
Kirk then pulls a "This Side of Paradise" and insults Spock until he loses it, and so declares Spock unfit for command, and so declares himself Captain, since Pike declared him First Officer a whole act ago.
I would've loved to have seen a Lieutenant Commander go "excuse me? You're a cadet. No." But oh well. Dramatic tension would've slowed things down -- we have an explosive finale to get to.
It was around this time that I realized the excuse for a plot was basically the plot of Nemesis again. Rogue Romulan with big-ass spaceship has a superweapon and is going to blow up Earth. Only this time with TOS characters and some time travel BS.
Anyways, with Kirk in command, we intercept Nero and have a big fight. Kirk and Spock beam over and pew pew laser guns with Nero's crew and I scratch my head at Nero's nonsensical ship design. I wish we had learned more about Nero and the villains. As it is I just don't care.
Some more Nemesis parallels as Spock pilots a small vessel around within the big ship shooting stuff, and then rams it into the ship, getting beamed out in the nick of time.
They manage to suck Nero and his big ship up into a black hole (the same black hole that earlier sent **** through time) and then escape said black hole by *ahem* ejecting the warp core and blowing it up and then riding the explosion out. Scotty specifically says "warp core" singular, but something like nine cores come flying out of the ship. Why? Same reason why King Kong fought three T-rexes in the remake instead of one -- more is cooler, dawg.
The question of why the explosion of nine warp cores doesn't just destroy the Enterprise (when the explosion of just one destroyed the Ent-D in Generations) doesn't matter because I stopped expecting this story to make sense about an hour and a half ago.
In gratitude for saving Earth, Kirk & Co. are all promoted to their familiar TOS positions officially, while Pike gets a (normal) wheelchair and a promotion to Admiral. No stem cell legs? No robot legs? Jeez, the future sucks.
One of my big facepalms in this movie was I kept getting dropped out of the idea that it was the 23rd Century. From the product placement (pretty sure commercialization didn't exist in Roddenberry's idea of the future) to the car/Beastie Boys to Pike in a normal wheelchair, the world has changed very little.
I have no idea where everyone keeps getting this idea that the utopian optimism is intact. I didn't see it. Yeah the future isn't shown as a dystopian wasteland, but I still didn't see Roddenberry's utopia in evidence.
And yeah, this story isn't about anything. No social commentary, no philosophical ideas, no deep thought. Just a fun action/adventure.
Mainly the point of this film was moving all the chess pieces around the board to get us in the position to do a sequel with all the familiar characters on board, only ten years younger than they were in the classic series.
In a good film, the director's job is to unify the various departments of a film to fit a coherent, consistent vision. Everything works together. That does not happen in this film. The costumes and sound effects tastefully update the old show, while the sets are completely different (and schizophrenic in and of itself). The film looks polished and beautiful, but the cinematography and editing is so haphazard and spastic that it's hard to see any of it. The CGI looks good in ONE SHOT -- the first reveal of the Enterprise (which is the same shot as our first sight, too) and that shot looks like a well-made model. The rest of the film is CGI. And meh CGI at that. I have no idea what Abrams was doing, because this film is a mish-mash of ideas and efforts, some great, some bland, and none of it coherent or consistent.
The movie's fun, it's got some good performances, it's got some good acting, it looks polished, the score is cool.
But damn is the story a massive facepalm.
I know people will say -- you're just being a and nitpicking little details and ignoring that the film is a great fun time -- but gods damnit thjerk e story was NON-EXISTANT! The movie was written by retarded five-year-olds with no idea how to realistically portray a Navy (even a future navy) or Science. At all. Even all the character development was just a rush to get from one CGI setpiece to another.
I have and always will maintain that intelligence and verisimilitude need not be sacrificed to tell a fun and entertaining story. I will maintain that view for as long as I live. I don't care that modern Hollywood seems to hold that "smart" and "fun" are incompatible -- I refuse to go along with that view!
As a Trekkie, I give this movie
4.5/10
And I apologize for the long, rambling, nit-picking, spoiler-filled post, I really do.
For any Trekkies who side with my (apparently extreme minority) opinion, I strongly continue to recommend William Shatner's new book Star Trek Academy: Collision Course
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