Star Trek Into Darkness [** SPOILERS FROM POST 452 **]

Myrddin

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar wrote: »

the plinkett reviews are absolutely fantastic if you can put your strange xenophobia aside for a couple of hours

I'm sure they are. I just always thought films should be judged on their own merit, not their reviews therefore I don't tend to find film reviews actually entertaining per se. I either like films or not, reviews hold no part in the judgment of the film for me. That may seem xenophobic today though, in some hipster sense.

Again though, I liked Star Trek, & found it an enjoyable watch. Under the skin though, it's the same old Star Trek with added lens flare, & a fresh coat of paint. Some of the roles were acted very true to the original characters & I liked that.

I'm looking forward to the sequel, this will be the real test. I will bet though, they won't be stealing whales from the past to save the future

Sad Professor

Plinkett's Star Trek reviews are terrible. Stupid fanboyish nitpicking about continuity and the timeline.

johnny_ultimate

It's the obsessive lore and backstories that turns me off investing any time in the huge amount of Star Trek content - indeed, I'd say the same about pretty much any fantasy or sci-fi saga. It gets to a point when the fun is sucked out of it. I have absolutely nothing against people who really invest in it, but it's important to realise that it's the very same reason a lot of people are so cynical and apathetic towards the franchise.

As said, I understand where fans might have been annoyed at Abrams' effort. But in bringing Star Trek back to what it began as - a lighthearted, knowingly cheesy serial with a charismatic cast of characters - it did a great job. And that they had a fun narrative justification for rebooting it was a particularly nice idea. As a film, it's far truer to the original Star Trek series - the only one I've ever watched multiple episodes of - than any of the other ST films I've seen over the years.

Sad Professor

I completely agree with all of the above.

I think a lot of Trek fans lost touch with what Star Trek was over the years. There was always a conflict anyway between Roddenberry's grandiose ideas about a utopian future and what the show actually was, i.e. a cheesy tv show about a bunch of characters on a ship having adventures.

norrie rugger

Sad Professor wrote: »

I completely agree with all of the above.

I think a lot of Trek fans lost touch with what Star Trek was over the years. There was always a conflict anyway between Roddenberry's grandioseideas about a utopian future and what the show actually was, i.e. a cheesy tv show about a bunch of characters on a ship having adventures.

Not really, Trek was cheesy but always tried to have a deeper meaning.

Goldstein

Sad Professor wrote: »

Plinkett's Star Trek reviews are terrible. Stupid fanboyish nitpicking about continuity and the timeline.

Did you watch them? Plinkett is a big fan of ST2009, he is utterly dismissive of the timeline complaints in the first 5 minutes later adding "who cares?" and never mentions anything to do with continuity. I've never seen a more flattering review from him and it's almost an hour long so he had plenty of time. He could have eviscerated it for a hundred different reasons (most of them a lot bigger than nitpicking status) but he barely criticised anything and when he did point out anything of question, mostly it wasn't with a critical purpose in mind but to illustrate and underscore the fact that it's unashamedly a pure action film, not a science fiction one so any ultra-techy nitpicking is irrelevant.

Any flaws highlighted in the last quarter are either macroscopically oriented to do with the films own internal logic, it's story, character motivations, or explained away uncritically as symptoms of the dumbing down, simplification and spelling out that they felt was necessary for the desired mass appeal. It's also the one that contains the now well known Sci-Fi Vs Sci-Fantasy differentiation.

In fact, it's more than just a fantastic review, it's a well researched, observant and impressively sewn together all encompassing deconstruction of why ST2009 is the film it is. Much of it could be applied to any modern blockbuster.

ST2009 is, to give full credit to the studio heads, an incredibly focused, blatant and really quite brilliantly clinical mass appealing attempt to make money at all costs purely off the back of nostalgia coupled with endless freneticly paced action sequences and filling the screen with as much crap at one time as possible. It's a perfect blueprint for financial success - I'm just not sure I want that same Roland Emmerich philosophy to always win out over genuine talent and originality.

How Orci and Kurtzman still have jobs at this stage though is baffling. Forgiving them their lazy and inept writing due to movies "only being blockbusters" is such a cop out.

What would Lord of the Rings have been without the passion, dedication, respect, knowledge and skill of Jackson and everyone involved? If all movies with a big budget are held to such low "sur it's only a popcorn flick" standards, we only have ourselves to blame for the quality of them in the future.

I know the first one was rushed and Abrams is adamant that it won't happen with the sequel but I don't think Abrams was the reason the plot made no sense whatsoever and was contrived at every turn, it's the screenwriters.

Nimoy line: "A star will explode and threaten the galaxy"
*shakes head in dismay*

And the useless hacks are back this time so, Star Trek aside, I'm prepared for the same fundamental film mistakes to reoccur next time. To finish on a positive: It was very well cast (Pegg aside), the production values were top notch, the ship/uniforms looked gorgeous, the Kobayashi Maru scene was excellent and um, oh ya Hemsworth's opening was a performance truly worthy of the franchise name: Star Trek.

johnny_ultimate

norrie rugger wrote: »

Not really, Trek was cheesy but always tried to have a deeper meaning.

It may have had certain general themes burning in the background, but it was never sci-fi on the intellectual scale of something like a Phillip K. Dick novel. And I have to admit being quite thrilled at how the interactions between Kirk and Spock gave the reboot a strong emotional and narrative core outside of the stuff blowing up.

As for Goldstein's post above, I fully agree Star Trek is as focus-tested as any 200 million dollar film would be. But I think it also has every bit the passion that Lord of the Rings does - the screenwriters and Abram come across as having a real affection for the characters and crafting a thrilling story. I saw the Artist today and thought that was often crassly and almost cynically crowd-pleasing. That's not a feeling I had watching ST, and I think that it's too the film's credit that despite some serious contrivances - Spock's dumping of Kirk was another one that always bothers me when watching - I was willing to forgive the flaws and just enjoy the ride. There are a tiny amount of blockbusters I'd say that about (MI3 is another one, not coincidentally).

Sad Professor

Goldstein wrote: »

Did you watch them? Plinkett is a big fan of ST2009, he is utterly dismissive of the timeline complaints in the first 5 minutes later adding "who cares?" and never mentions anything to do with continuity. I've never seen a more flattering review from him and it's almost an hour long so he had plenty of time. He could have eviscerated it for a hundred different reasons (most of them a lot bigger than nitpicking status) but he barely criticised anything and when he did point out anything of question, mostly it wasn't with a critical purpose in mind but to illustrate and underscore the fact that it's unashamedly a pure action film, not a science fiction one so any ultra-techy nitpicking is irrelevant.

Interesting. I haven't actually watched his review of the 2009 film. My earlier comment was based on some of his TNG reviews, which I thought were very nitpicky and failed to really point out what was wrong with the films, even in the case Nemesis.

As for Orci and Kurtzman, they've been working with Abrams since Alias, long before they wrote Transformers, so I guess he just has a rapport with them. I would put a lot of the mistakes (like Pike not knowing the difference between Starfleet and the Federation) down to the writers strike preventing them from doing a final polish. Afaik this also limited Abrams's ability to re-write the script while shooting like he did on M:I:3.

krudler

two of my favourite openings to summer blockbusters of the last decade right here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=di4YUNoQqqc

Abrams sure as hell knows how to make a compelling opening sequence. I remember MI3 starting and by the time Hoffman was halfway through his count the whole cinema was silent, and it was packed.

Goldstein

Sad Professor wrote: »

Interesting. I haven't actually watched his review of the 2009 film. My earlier comment was based on some of his TNG reviews, which I thought were very nitpicky and failed to really point out what was wrong with the films, even in the case Nemesis.

Yes, I concur. In fairness I'd be a big fan but he did seem to be going out of his way in the 4 TNG reviews to find hyper-penantry to complain about - it's sometimes warranted given the context of the movies but there is such a thing as going too far. I agree with the consensus that the TNG films were a pretty bad representation of what the Next Generation was actually about (I do really love First Contact although I appreciate its weaker points - out of character Picard for one) but he went a bit overboard.

The way I look at it, if there's something fundamentally problematic with a film you should be able to expose that on a higher level without having to resort to complaining about just the minor details which I'm sometimes guilty of myself. Plinkett did shift my position ever so slightly to ignore some of those things that would have irked me in the past and instead try to pinpoint the major issues I had with the plot etc and take the film more in context of what it's supposed to be rather than comparing it to something like TNG or DS9.

Some of what I'm hearing from Abrams is encouraging - he genuinely seems pissed that he was rushed to complete the first movie so that implies he might take a more pro-active and considered role in the screenplay/script for no. 2. I hope he does because they have a lot of other elements in place to deliver a Star Trek for all - I'm thinking of MI3 which was one of my favourite action movies of recent years. A decent screenplay with the help of a few ST consultants and they really could be onto something special with the cast and backing they have.

Syferus

I remember reading that Abrams wants to expand the series into more thoughtful material in the second film, and that belies the reasons the 2009 film still sits in a strange place for me; it's by any quantitative measure a very good blockbuster, but it also sacrifices offering much beyond 'honour and friendship are good, yo' in terms of themes.

I couldn't give a damn about continuity or OCD fanboyisms of that ilk, but were it not for the social and philosophical aspects of Star Trek, there wouldn't have ever been enough desire for the reboot to even exist. Star Trek was always more than a hokey little tv show, at its best it always offered a platfrom for radical ideas to be discussed under the fire blanket of science fiction. It felts like the 2009 film got the syntax, the broad outlines of character down fantastically well, but that there wasn't much depth to proceedings. Some of the interactions between the crew felt almost clinically designed to make me smile on only a superficial level, with the intention being someone who is very casually aware of Krik, Spock and McCoy getting the jokes - they were hardly insider jokes.

And yet they tried to tie in regular Star Trek continuity. I'd have much performed them to cut ties with the old world of Star Trek completely and not have Nimoy's Spock be from the established world of Star Trek. It was a muddled message; the film wanted to be it's own master on most levels yet they decided to capitalize on almost archetypal Star Trek characters, but without some of the fibre that made them who they were. What would a totally new Star Trek movie by Abrams have looked like? It'd have at least meant alot of the nit-picking would be straight out the window, but the creators chose to lay in that bed and accept the bad with the good.

I'm not someone out to lambast the film because being a big budget blockbuster as well as an origins story leaves very little time in a two-hour slot to offer treatises as well, and action will always take a front seat in the movie series. I'd just like to see Abrams and company find an effective way to raise the sorts of questions that made Star Trek, TNG, whatever, indelible in a modern way. Christopher Nolan has shown with The Dark Knight and Inception that it's possible to be more than Indiana Jones in space and still be a boat load of fun, and his characterizations, sans The Joker, are hardly more favourful than Star Trek's.

I hope Abrams has used the first film as an establishing shot for the sequel - I'll likely enjoy whatever is produced as long as it's good, but that is more of a challenge with Star Trek on the poster. That name still means something to me.

hightower1

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar wrote: »

yeah he rebooted it and it's massively popular now but it's not star trek anymore
it's just generic action sci fi blockbuster with the crew of the original series

more power to him if that's what people want to watch but it just gets a big fat meh from me.

Totally agree, its not start trek anymore and its not a reboot.
You cant call something a reboot when you totally change the fundimentals of the original concept and slap the same name on.

Its just like all the big studios now buying rights to major brand names knowing that the end product will actually have very little to do with the brand itself ad are just buying the rights for name recognition. In the end , times are tough for punters and are less likely to spend money on seeing a flick that they have no assositaion with so studios buy up brand rights in order to have a familiar name so people will be more likely to part with cash to see it.

At its core the new trek really isnt trek at all , it shares a title and charecter names with the original concept but thats about it. They could have relased this under a totally new IP but it wouldnt have done as well at the box office.

Im not saying it was a bad movie, I quite enjoyed it but it was in no way a true star trek movie.

If fanta bought coca cola and changed the drink to a pinapple flavoured squash more people would try it based on the name alone....but it sure as sh1t wouldnt be the coca cola we all know right now.

G-Money

I like ST2009 but there was something missing from the story. It seemed to run along ok until Kirk gets onto the Enterprise and meets Spock on the Star Wars ice planet of Hoth Then it sort of repeats itself or something.

I'm sure they'll do better with the next one.

G-Money

I think First Contact had a great opening theme song and the end one wasn't too bad either for obvious reasons

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mhoa7oWPPhk

End Theme

hightower1

G-Money wrote: »

I like ST2009 but there was something missing from the story. It seemed to run along ok until Kirk gets onto the Enterprise and meets Spock on the Star Wars ice planet of Hoth Then it sort of repeats itself or something.

I'm sure they'll do better with the next one.

09 trek suffered from the same comparison of alien - aliens 4.

In the original alien movie less was more, less alien on screen time, less music and less gore. When these elements WERE on screen it really punctuated their impact.

With the last aliens movie we saw all three aspects way too much, it numbed their effect at citical points when they were over used.

The same applies with trek, there was a sense of naval dignity with star trek, it was a defining aspect and set against that we felt justified when we saw friendship and commeraradery between the officers - it was what we woudl expect from thenaval setting. Set against a backdrop and tone like that any humour felt subtle and apprechiated, drama felt like it had weight to it and action felt visceral.

When 09 trek came along it turned the dial to 11, downed a 6'er of red bull and wore a tap out tshirt. It tried to up the humour constantly so when a joke came along the tone was already so light twords the end it had no impact at all. It spinkled action at every step it could so action set pieces at the end felt dull and had no weight. The only thing that attempted to stand out was Kirks and Spocks friendship at the end and that was because it had contrast to how their relationship was for nearly 3/4s the way through. Contrast with these movies were key and 09 trek lacked it in spades.

Its what defined it as "star trek for dummies". I dont know what that says about me in the end because I enjoyed it but I did view it as I did a vin diesel movie (bar pitch black which was excellent) - a dumb turn off your brain whizz bang action movie.

I hope the creative team take heed of their mis steps this time around and learn to use contrast in this movie, not everything needs to be dialled up to 11.

Also....... less fcuking lense flare!!!!! Fcuk you Abrhams , nearly everything in the media for a year after decided it needed lense flare EVERYWHERE to be flashy.

thorbarry

As a big star trek fan I loved the reboot. Fair enough it changed alot, and was more action orientated but the series needed that.

There is no place of the star trek of old on the cinema screen, Insurrection was pretty bad, Nemesis flopped and was also crap. They couldnt have made another movie like them otherwise people wouldnt have gone to see it. It needed something different.

I for one am glad, and I love it

By far my favourite moment in the whole movie was when Sulu and Kirk were making their way down to the drill, with the third member wearing a red shirt. I almost burst out laughing, because it meant that the red shirted guy was sure to die when, lo and behold, he does.

PerrinV2

Deleted User wrote: »

By far my favourite moment in the whole movie was when Sulu and Kirk were making their way down to the drill, with the third member wearing a red shirt. I almost burst out laughing, because it meant that the red shirted guy was sure to die when, lo and behold, he does.

Ya its always the guy in red

(about 20 seconds in)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cXM15X_Fo0Y

Lantus

G-Money wrote: »

I think First Contact had a great opening theme song and the end one wasn't too bad either for obvious reasons

FC was a great movie until you realise that the borg were stupid by not just going back in time in any old quiet corner of the universe and flying to earth rather than rocking up on it's doorstep when there were dozens of federation ships to shoot at it. plot hole...........................

I can still enjoy the star trek movies but they just didn't translate to the big screen that well. Too many of the TNG movies are reliant on time travel gone bad or storys that would of made a passable 45 minute tv show.

thorbarry

Deleted User wrote: »

By far my favourite moment in the whole movie was when Sulu and Kirk were making their way down to the drill, with the third member wearing a red shirt. I almost burst out laughing, because it meant that the red shirted guy was sure to die when, lo and behold, he does.

LOL i'm pretty sure that was intentional

Scanlas The 2nd

Lantus wrote: »

G-Money wrote: »

I think First Contact had a great opening theme song and the end one wasn't too bad either for obvious reasons

FC was a great movie until you realise that the borg were stupid by not just going back in time in any old quiet corner of the universe and flying to earth rather than rocking up on it's doorstep when there were dozens of federation ships to shoot at it. plot hole...........................

I can still enjoy the star trek movies but they just didn't translate to the big screen that well. Too many of the TNG movies are reliant on time travel gone bad or storys that would of made a passable 45 minute tv show.

Or they could just send a few more of their thousands of ships and guarantee victory. It's stupid really, time travel should only be an accidental rare anomaly.

don ramo

yay more post production 3D conversion, :mad::mad:

http://insidemovies.ew.com/2012/01/08/j-j-abrams-star-trek-2-in-3-d/

wonder what a 3D lense flare will look like;):D:rolleyes:

Sad Professor

I delighted that Abrams can see 3D for the waste of time that it is. He mentioned shooting some of the film in IMAX instead, though I'm not sure what benefit that would have in a CGI heavy film like this.

norrie rugger

Scanlas The 2nd wrote: »

Or they could just send a few more of their thousands of ships and guarantee victory.

Read the Star Trek: Destiny trilogy and you get a feeling what it would be like, to have just that.

OldeCinemaSoz

Being an unashamed TOS fan i'd give a finger...or even me arm out of this sling...for a big screen adaptation of THE DOOMSDAY MACHINE.

no wonder it won an emmy. i won't get started on CITY ON THE EDGE OF FOREVER. Reverential. Although i'm not too fond of the other one AMOK TIME.

thorbarry

don ramo wrote: »

yay more post production 3D conversion, :mad::mad:

http://insidemovies.ew.com/2012/01/08/j-j-abrams-star-trek-2-in-3-d/

That doesnt annoy me at all. I'll just go see it in 2d

don ramo

thorbarry wrote: »

That doesnt annoy me at all. I'll just go see it in 2d

as will i, but i hate when they shoot a scene that is purely meant for 3D, and looks retarded in 2D,

thats one of my main problems with 3D, some of angles and effects they use look stupid and amateurish in 2D, it looks like the director didnt know what he was doing, and relalistically your only gonna watch a film once in 3D and only in the cinema, so there taking away the rewatchability of the film,

Pride Fighter

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

I am not a Trekkie but frankly I really don't care about why a mining ship was heavily armed :pac: Id certainly acknowledge a few plotholes and cheap contrivances - quickest promotions ever. But are your issues with the film as a Trek fan or are they with the film itself? You can nitpick scifi to death, but IMO it is never a rewarding exercise.

Undiscovered Country is better than 2 of them.

Antar Bolaeisk

So..... when did this get pushed back to next year, I though it was meant to be 2012?

I'm sad now.

(for the record, I think Trek 2009 was quite a good film, it did all the actiony and explodey bits extremely well but it was also ridiculously stupid so it just wasn't a good Star Trek film) - longtime trek fan

senordingdong

Sad Professor wrote: »

I disagree. I was a very big Star Trek fan and I loved Abrams's film. It's not perfect. I can see all the little errors and annoyances that the purists see, but the positives outweigh the negatives. Star Trek was as good as dead until the Abrams film. Star Trek needed a good reboot and that's what he gave it.

I was bitterly disappointed by this reboot.

It looked good, full of fancy visuals and what nots but the movie was completely lacking in any depth.
It was pure style over substance.
The plot was based entirely on time travel which is the lowest common denominator of all sci fi stories.
Whatsmore, being accidentally sent back in time after a natural disaster (for which no-one was to blame) I don't understand how Nero could be seeking revenge. As if warning his planet of the impending disaster was not a more intelligent course of action.
With the exception of Kirk and Spock, there was no character development and more than a few of the scenes didn't gel particularly well together.

And lets not forget the watering down for mainstream audiences and the fact that modern Hollywood now has free reign on the Star Trek name.