J.J. Abrams' Star Trek Into Darkness

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CelticPredator said:
Money.

Simple as that. Star Trek will never work as a film again. They spent 20 years trying to make the series into action schlock. Now they finally hit that right mark. And now it's better then the current Star Wars films/
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Yes, but this is still STAR TREK. Don't be fooled by the "Apple Store" looking bridge, the flashier production values, etc. The core characters are the same, there is still room for thoughtful, intelligent messages and character growth/exploration amongst the "whiz bang". The destruction of Vulcan is a perfect example: as a long-time fan, that had such emotional resonance for me. I felt it right along with Spock. In fact, it was in that great tradition of cinematic moments like the "death of Spock" or Picard becoming Locutus (best cliffhanger ever?) that just ups the ante and makes things exciting because nothing is off the table. Star Trek doesn't always hit those moments, but when it does, it's fantastic. When I saw Vulcan destroyed, I was just thinking "I can't believe they went there", but not in a negative way - it was daring and great storytelling. It gave me hope that this reboot will be handled well. This group has basically been able to take a "What if?" conceit to Star Trek, where the classic story lines play out in different, unexpected ways, and do it in a way that is both canon and allows older fans to keep their Star Trek continuity intact in their minds (alternate universe was genius!). This reboot is hitting all the right marks, taking a beloved property and making it fresh for both a new generation and the built-in following. Can't wait to see what "Into Darkness" brings! :yess:
 
a-dev said:
Then why call it Star Trek? The first film was acceptable, but I hope they don't stray too far away. I don't think they will. I'm just saying.
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Nah, I don't think that's a concern. Yes, events are playing out differently, but it's still set withing the framework of the Star Trek universe. All the familiar aliens and worlds are still out there (except Vulcan :monkey2), the crew will likely still encounter familiar characters and places, just in different ways. And the nature of the relationships between core characters can change, characters could die that lived in the "old" timeline, and vice versa. Also, there's sort of a 'ripple effect' from the events of the last film. The further out in space and the closer in time you are to those events, the less change there will be, because, like dropping a rock in a pond, the ripples haven't had time to reach distant shores. Our intrepid crew was at the center of those events, so the changes will be more pronounced. But it will still be "Star Trek". :)
 
I enjoyed the reboot and am looking forward to this. But to me it's nothing like TOS, obviously things need to be different for a film than a tv show but there was almost no classic Trek scenarios in the reboot.

No landing party away missions, discovering M class planets with skewed civilisations, no energy beings or supercomputers, no Pon Farr, Kirk didn't command the same respect.

To me it was a space action movie reskinned to look like the Trek franchise. Hopefully this sequel will have the characters and their characterisations match better with who they are supposed to be with story scenarios familiar to the franchise
 
I hated the first one. I didn't feel like I was watching a Trek movie. I'm only interested in this one for Benedict Cumberbatch as the villain.
 
Nova said:
No landing party away missions, discovering M class planets with skewed civilisations, no energy beings or supercomputers, no Pon Farr, Kirk didn't command the same respect.

To me it was a space action movie reskinned to look like the Trek franchise. Hopefully this sequel will have the characters and their characterisations match better with who they are supposed to be with story scenarios familiar to the franchise
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With the exception of Kirk commanding respect (oh, and Pon Farr, but that was kinda weird...and Kirk tried to talk a computer to death in ST:TMP, but it was pretty boring), these criticisms could fairly be leveled at ALL the Trek films. Why would Kirk command respect at this point? He's a recent graduate of the academy! I say he earned an extreme amount of respect (and a starship command for saving Earth). This movie was largely about jockeying the characters into position and establishing relationships. I'd consider the battle over Vulcan on the Romulan weapon the first "away" mission of the series. By all reports, Into Darkness starts off with the crew on an away mission. All in all, this was a more successful (and arguably more enjoyable) reboot to the series than "ST:TMP".
 
The command thing is my big problem with the new films. Why race to put Kirk in the Captain's chair within a single film? They could have done that over two or three films. When he commands the E for the first time there should be NO DOUBT he belongs there.

Biggest misfire of the first JJ Trek.
 
Kamandi said:
The command thing is my big problem with the new films. Why race to put Kirk in the Captain's chair within a single film? They could have done that over two or three films. When he commands the E for the first time there should be NO DOUBT he belongs there.

Biggest misfire of the first JJ Trek.
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I'll give you that one, it did seem forced, even with the "he saved Earth" rationale. The only explanation isn't that it was meant to be good story-telling, so much as they didn't want the arc to carry over through other films. They wanted this one to be the "set-up" for any future undertakings. The "alternate universe/timeline" was used as a crutch in this instance. Thing is, they could have done a "flash-forward" at the end of the film, a year or so after the events of movie, where we see a ceremony with Kirk being made Captain...something. Oh well, I guess I can forgive them that one plot point, even if it does bug me.
 
They took some dialogue from STII:TWOK and blew it up into a big plot point in JJ's ST.

I never pictured Shatner's Kirk as someone who faced Acedemic probation, esp. since he was an Academy instructor prior to the five year mission. "A Commendation for original thinking" is a long way from near expulsion.

Also - The destruction of Vulcan for shock value has boxed them in IMHO. A very important setting in the trek universe and they disposed on it without much thought. I also thought Vulcan was worthy of more design creativity than cloning Vasqez Rocks over and over.
 
Kamandi said:
They took some dialogue from STII:TWOK and blew it up into a big plot point in JJ's ST.

I never pictured Shatner's Kirk as someone who faced Acedemic probation, esp. since he was an Academy instructor prior to the five year mission. "A Commendation for original thinking" is a long way from near expulsion.

Also - The destruction of Vulcan for shock value has boxed them in IMHO. A very important setting in the trek universe and they disposed on it without much thought. I also thought Vulcan was worthy of more design creativity than cloning Vasqez Rocks over and over.
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Here, I'm going to disagree with you. All of this is a direct result of the timeline interference. Kirk's father was killed by Nero and Kirk grew up being rebellious (which necessitated the inclusion of the scene where he drives his uncle's car off a cliff). He only joins Starfleet after a pep-talk from Pike about throwing his life away. None of this would have happened in the Prime universe. Kirk is at the center of the time disruption, being born on the first day it occurred - the point is, though he was born the same man, his life was not what Kirk Prime's life was (it's kinda the same theme they were getting at in Star Trek: Nemesis). He defeated the Kobayashi Maru in both universes, but in the Prime Universe, Kirk was "a stack of books with legs"; in the Abrams Trekverse, Kirk is more of a renegade and troublemaker. People reacted to his "accomplishment" very differently because of how he conducted himself in life.

The destruction of Vulcan was shocking, certainly. But done just for shock value? I dunno. Abrams has said this was the 9/11 of Trek, and won't go into detail about how that plays out in "Into Darkness". That suggests to me that there was thought put into this and it will have consequences, both personally for our characters and far reaching with regard to their reality. How can it not?
 
K07 said:
I hated the first one. I didn't feel like I was watching a Trek movie. I'm only interested in this one for Benedict Cumberbatch as the villain.
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It was great but, at the same time i could think back to Nemesis and say that i enjoyed it more then the Abrams Trek movie.

Probally one of the least favored Trek movies but, i liked it and Tom Hardy's performance as Praetor Shinzon

[ame="https://youtu.be/aTPdWYo9zhQ"]https://youtu.be/aTPdWYo9zhQ[/ame]
 
abake said:
Actually, I think you mistyped something. :D
Doesn't matter, it just looked strange when I read it.
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Possibly. I just really don't like Star Trek, at all. But these movies are awesome.

Real Trek isn't "awesome". :lol. I also don't know a thing about it, so I spent a while trying to come up with some BS that I can see didn't make sense.

RLM loves Star Trek. And they enjoyed the new movie, but explained why it worked.
 
CelticPredator said:
https://blip.tv/redlettermedia/star-trek-2009-review-part-1-of-2-4088156
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OMFG, this review is 1/2 hour long - for PART 1??? I ain't got that much time for a guy who talks like he's got a turd in his mouth. Fact is, Paramount was kicking around the idea of recasting the TOS characters for further outings back in the early 90s. No joke. The original actors were too old to pull it off anymore and were retired. Paramount was unsure about how TNG would fare on the big screen. So they thought about doing a "reboot" before that term ever existed with regard to movies. Instead, they went back to the well so many times on TV that the well ran dry and they kept on bringing up buckets of dust...mainly thanks to Rick Berman and Brannon Braga. They had to let the franchise cool a few years to allow people to miss it and forget about the last several uninspired years worth of Trek (mainly most of Voyager and most of Enterprise). So now it's back, they've tried to make it fun and put a little distance between it and the last few Trek shows. That doesn't mean it isn't Trek, it just means those shows were Trek at it's worst. Trek at it's best is fun, so because this incarnation of Trek is fun, doesn't mean it's not Trek. And the guy with **** in his mouth just sounds kinda tired and jaded, despite the attempts at humor. :lol
 
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