Star Trek: Into Darkness

[Slamz]

Speaking of JJ Abrams, who else saw Into Darkness?

[spoiler]I think I would have enjoyed it a whole lot more if I wasn't already a Star Trek fan and thought of Wrath of Khan as one of the best. Why they decided to do a spin-off version of Wrath of Khan, I can't imagine. They couldn't come up with something original??

I didn't find the overall story to be nearly as good or compelling as Wrath of Khan and the obvious "re-imagining" of a couple of iconic WoK scenes just spoiled it for me, in a "I've seen this before, and the original was better" sort of way.

I'd kind of like to watch it again, bracing myself for the fact that it IS a re-imagining, and not a totally original movie, but on the first pass I thought it was disappointing.[/spoiler]

[Jakensama]

I was shocked it never got spoiled for me despite the fact I saw it 3 weeks late. Some asshat had spoiled Iron Man 3 prior to it even premiering officially.

I thought both of the new films were better than the source material, but then again I really particularly cared for any Star Trek other than DS9 (Rodenberry's utopian universe wasn't very compelling and episodic storytelling was always weak).

[Zirak]

I saw it and quite enjoyed it.
[spoiler]Unlike yourself, I liked the homage to Wrath of Khan. I smiled each time I caught one of the lines from WoK enter the dialogue in a slightly different way. I enjoyed the continuing development of the relationship between Spock and Kirk as well.

Overall I really enjoyed the movie. All that said I thought they made Khan way too much of a superman. I also wish they would freaking lose the stupid transwarp transporter crap - it makes starships largely pointless. I also wish they would stop making the universe smaller - I remember when it used to take days to get from earth to Qo'nos rather than just taking a couple of hours.[/spoiler]

[Vanraw]

I liked it. But for the most part I liked it for an action movie.

[Chain]

It was big and pretty, but shallow. Standard action movie fare. Not a bad movie on it's face, but a Star Trek movie deserved better.

[Jakensama]

Not a bad movie on it's face, but a Star Trek movie deserved better.

Not sure about that, if a movie isn't bad on it's face that makes it better than more than half of the existing star trek movies..

[Diggles]

just another crappy movie from ADHD generation. Startrek is about future society, not just action-scifi & explosions

[OrsunVZ]

Really? The trouble with tribbles was about future society? I hear you though. My favorite element from Avatar was the exploration of the world and its various ecosystems. That layer is hugely missing from most sci fi, and it is actually what MAKES sci fi. Space ships and photon torpedoes are such household names now, that a sci-fi action flick isn't really sci fi anymore.

Even a cheesy movie like Starship Troopers, was AWESOME because of the way they dealt with making the viewer learn about the world and the people/bugs in it.

[Slamz]

I think it could also be argued that ST:TNG was hugely about future-society while the original series was largely an action based TV show. Kirk gets into a fist fight in almost every episode and they definitely continued that trend into the new movies.

Although even some of TOS episodes had pretty good statements to make... A Taste of Armageddon was one of my favorite episodes of all Star Trek. The two new movies haven't really done much except blow things up and have fancy sci-fi shootouts and fist fights. (I still think the sword fight from the first movie was dumb.)

[Grieve]

I just saw it, and enjoyed it a lot. I'd guessed it was about [spoiler]Khan[/spoiler] from rumors I'd heard, but thought it was more a homage than a "desecration" (as one Trek friend of my described it).

I was never a trekkie, but I enjoyed the original series a lot more than TNG, which I thought was dry and stuffy. TOS had much better chemistry between the actors, more emotional (if hammy) performances, and better social commentary (not to mention barrier breakers like a multinational crew and interracial (and interspecies!) kisses).

To me the new movies evoke TOS in a way TNG never did, even if they don't have the same groundbreaking themes (so far).

[Slamz]

I think where the new movies are really going wrong is that they are treating Starfleet as if it was a military and starships as warships.

The ships in Star Trek were almost all primarily science and exploration vessels. They all had weapons and shields but the reason they were so huge with such a large crew is that they were mainly science vessels.

The new movies have none of that. Both movies have basically had all of the ships as warships firing more photons and phasers in 1 minute than I think we saw in all of TOS combined. If the Federation was really making warships, they would all be more like the Defiant from DS9: a really small ship with nothing but weapons, shields and military people to man them.


Granted a movie about futuristic science and exploration probably wouldn't be as popular as Star Trek: Bourne Identity With Phasers In Space but they are pretty well missing the whole point of Star Trek.

[Grieve]

Been a while since I saw the first one, but from I remember most of the shooting in that one came from the Romulan ship from the future.

For the most recent one, again, it was the "dreadnought" class that "John Harrison" helped Admiral Marcus design that had all the firepower...I don't recall the Enterprise firing at all. It was pretty clear that Marcus was a rogue admiral who was trying to force a war with the Klingons.

At the very end of the movie, the repaired Enterprise launches for that "5 year mission", so you may see more science and exploration in the future. But a movie is always going to be different from a TV series, especially a big expensive special effects movie. I'm pretty sure most of the original cast movies had a bunch of fighting too.

[Jakensama]

Granted a movie about futuristic science and exploration probably wouldn't be as popular as Star Trek: Bourne Identity With Phasers In Space but they are pretty well missing the whole point of Star Trek.

Well Star Trek was only good once DS9 got to the Dominion War, so I guess they learned their lesson from that and decided to do away with all the hippy Roddenberry "we've evolved beyond the need for money in a few centuries but somehow people are motivated to do something other than fuck hot girls in the holodeck 24/7" garbage.

[Slamz]

That's a bit like saying "the best movie in the world is Bad Boys 2".

Kind of a shallow perspective on art and entertainment. Although I don't doubt that there are more "action fans who tolerate sci-fi" than there are "drama fans who tolerate sci-fi" and I suspect both them outnumber "sci-fi fans", so I suppose it's really just them doing what's popular.

I do hope the next movies can get a little more intellectual, though. Into Darkness was right around the level of Lethal Weapon in terms of intellectual entertainment. I liked Lethal Weapon, I just don't think it needs to be set in the Star Trek universe.

[spoiler][youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6B22Uy7SBe4[/youtube][/spoiler]

[Jakensama]

That's a bit like saying "the best movie in the world is Bad Boys 2".

Kind of a shallow perspective on art and entertainment. Although I don't doubt that there are more "action fans who tolerate sci-fi" than there are "drama fans who tolerate sci-fi" and I suspect both them outnumber "sci-fi fans", so I suppose it's really just them doing what's popular.

Nothing to do with action, its just that Star Trek was ridiculously idealistic and unrealistic, and most importantly until midway through DS9, almost completely episodic with maybe a two parter thrown in. That is poor dramatic story telling that we have thankfully largely grown out of. I think TNG gets given a lot more credit than it deserves since there was a lack of decent alternative sci fi available at the time.

In the Pale Moonlight was the best Star Trek episode ever made - not remotely action packed, and unsurprisingly an episode that would have made Roddenberry roll in his grave.

I do hope the next movies can get a little more intellectual, though. Into Darkness was right around the level of Lethal Weapon in terms of intellectual entertainment. I liked Lethal Weapon, I just don't think it needs to be set in the Star Trek universe.

I really wouldn't have classified any of the pre-reimagining Star Trek films as particularly intellectual, although they were less action oriented as is the day. Except for the time travelling whale one where he tries to talk to the computer, that one was smart as hell

I doubt there will be less action in the new ones though, they want to broaden the fan base (and seem to have suceeded) and they had a guy who had never watched Star Trek to direct the damn things.

They should totally make the episode Badger talked about in breaking bad though:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqIJ3hgkIDY[/youtube]

[Zirak]

They have the foil of alternate timeline to let them have Star Fleet evolve in a different way than the Star Fleet we know from the TV series. This is a Star Fleet that had to deal with an enemy who way outlcassed them at an early stage in their development and have thus developed in a more militaristic way.

[Breand]

just another crappy movie from ADHD generation. Startrek is about future society, not just action-scifi & explosions

Which Star Trek were you watching? That is really only the case with TNG and maybe Voyager. The original series, and the original series movies were all action fests except for the Save the Whales one.

I did not like Into Darkness. To the point that I'm actually freaked out a bit that Abrams is doing Star Wars now because I think he has peaked. [spoiler]Why they needed to mine Wrath of Khan, I have no idea. And the death scene fell flat because one and a half movies is not nearly enough time to be invested in the new characters to care enough about the bond they have, which is basically "next to none" so far. So the death scene felt ridiculous. Even the opening sequence felt so silly. Khan is a super genius but he needs some schmuck with a dying daughter to blow up Starfleet? Meh.[/spoiler]

[Jakensama]

Plot holes in a Trek Movie? Never!!

I am still curious why the Borg in First Contact decided they needed to fly all the way to Earth and fight all the federation ships and THEN go back in time to assimilate humans. If you could time travel why would you not just go back in time and then fly to Earth when it doesn't have a military to protect it?

Interesting point about the lack of time we've had to care about the characters. Its one of the reason I don't mind my sci fi flicks to be more actiony, lets face it - films as a medium are now inferior to television in telling decent stories with characters we give a fuck about due to limited time. Post Sopranos TV is a far better dramatic medium to get a story across than trying to cram shit into 2 hours..

[Slamz]

[spoiler]That's a great point about the death scene in Into Darkness. It worked in Wrath of Khan because that movie is supposed to take place something like 20 years into their careers together so Kirk and Spock are lifelong friends. In Into Darkness it's happening on what seems to be their second mission together ever. It would be like having the Khan scene in the second episode of TOS.[/spoiler]

TOS had some good "hard-scifi" style commentary, though. "A Taste of Armageddon" is one that always stuck with me. Two planets are at war and they've made war so clean and sterile that nobody felt like putting an end to it. That's pretty relevant today.

"The Return of the Archons" is another good one -- a planet being run by a computer has created a society where nobody is free to act or think on their own. They must follow the will of Landru.


I dunno what the hard sci-fi story of most of the newer Treks are, especially the two new movies. They could have just as easily done the whole thing as a modern naval movie or set in the 1800s. The only thing sci-fi about it is the setting. Half the point of sci-fi was to allow a story to be told that simply couldn't be told using modern or historical settings.

[Vllad]

Movies like the latest is going to hurt Star Trek and not really help it.

You guys are all looking at it from old men eyes.

If I was 20 years old and never watched any Star Trek before the entire plot wouldn't make much sense. They don't explain who Khan is or why the fuck 300 year old dudes are bad asses. You would have absolutely no clue what Star Fleet is other than a bunch of douche bags. Other than breast the story has as much depth as a piece of paper.

[Jakensama]

Hurt Star Trek how? Considering how most of the movies were atrociously rated (The reboot was the highest aggregate rated and into darkness was fourth after khan and first contract) and how much more profitable they are than their predecessors, I'm not sure how much damage has been done.

The complaint that you would know nothing about star trek if you were a noob has nothing to do with the reboots and everything to do with the movie format. If I watched any of the other movies in a vaccuum I wouldn't know anything about the mythos either.

Neither of these new movies were masterpeices, but they still rank pretty highly compared to the vast majority of the previous 10 cinema experiments. Wrath of Khan is still the best though, little else is as amusing as watching Shatner and Montelban in an overacting competition.

Plus, anyone who can rile up as many trekkies as JJ Abrams has can't be all that bad!

I wouldn't be as worried if you are a Star Wars nerd, as Abrams has actually confirmed his fandom of those films as opposed to being unfamiliar with Star Trek in general. Unless you are a huge EU nerd, in which case you will likely be mad no matter what anyone does unless someone does a page for page shot of the Thrawn book or something.

[Vllad]

Hurt Star Trek how?

The single most important aspect of Star Trek is its depth. Star Trek has survived not because it has the best stories but because its cannon has more depth than any fictional world ever created.

The long term viability of the stories and hence the long term capability of the franchise to make money relies on that depth. Their wouldn't have been 4 series and 10 movies without it.

If the current holders of the cannon forget that people will stop watching. While people will continue to make Shrek XIV and Transformers XXI but the lack of depth has lead to considerable viewer reduction over time.

[Jakensama]

You aren't going to maintain any depth in a storyline unless there is a TV show. Movies every few year don't really generate that much depth. The only way you are going to get any Star Trek depth is to make a new series. I wouldn't mind a rebooted new series - you could get to the whole explore and discover roots but also make it less campy than the original and perhaps do it like a proper tv show with episodic continuity.

IMO Star Trek survived in no small part because there was never much else science fiction on and what else were us dorks supposed to watch?

Its just like Star Wars. Both created very interesting worlds, but lets face it - the acting has always sucked, there have been plot holes larger than flabbo, and the writing has been often quite awful (TOS did have a lot of decent writers back in the day which almost made up for terrible acting). Nostalgia imbues a lot to a series. Hell, I have met older folks who try to say the original battlestar galactica was good, and it is patently awful.

Its like my little nephews, they prefer the new star wars to the older ones - and apparently they are not alone in the opinion of little kids.