Star Trek
Short version: Go see it!
Long version: Go see it now!
Seriously. It is that good.
Okay, now that I got that established, lemme get to the details.
Beauty and I saw the Midnight showing of the latest Star Trek movie. We showed up around 9PM at the Century City mall in LA and were in line for the flick at about 10:30 or so on Thursday night and we got let in to the Imax theater at about 11. The movie started up just after Midnight. By that time the entire theater was sold out. We were packed in there surrounded by Trekkies, Trekkers, Star Trek fans, and geeks of all other stripes. Everyone there was enthused about the prospect of taking in this latest installment in the venerable Star Trek franchise.
And we were not disappointed.
This movie rocked from start to finish.
The production values were top notch, the acting was spot on, the script was very well written, and the plot held together quite nicely. The CGI was excellent and the cinematography in general was a treat to watch.
For anyone who had any doubts as to this latest Trek film being but a rehash of others or of the TV series you can set those doubts aside.
I've read a number of comments which portray this latest Star Trek film as being a "reboot" of the entire series / franchise and I think that's a pretty accurate description. The Star Trek franchise had essentially run itself dry and run itself into the ground. " The Original Series" (ST:TOS) TV show got reincarnated in a bigger and better fashion with a bigger and better Enterprise in "Star Trek: The Next Generation" (ST:TNG) and that had a spectacular run. When that ran out they then figured a way to tell the Star Trek tale whilst keeping the Enterprise anchored in place by turning it into a space station - this being "Star Trek: Deep Space 9" (ST:DS9) and even before that ran out they tried retelling the Star Trek tale by taking the Enterprise out of the Federation entirely - "Star Trek: Voyager" (ST:V) and when that failed they then tried telling the Star Trek tale by sending the Enterprise into the past with... well.. "Enterprise."
By this time there was really nothing left for them to do in the series. Go further into the future? Try a "Star Trek: The Next Next Generation?" Hmm... no. Go further into the past with a pre-Enterprise "Enterprise - the Prequel?" Hmm... no. So, what was left?
Simple. Pick a point in the known continuity of the franchise and change it from there forward. Make something entirely new out of the old stuff. Make it exactly the same - only different. And that's exactly what they did here.
There's risks with such things. Mucking about with icons is fraught with them. Some times it works - just look at how Nolan "reimagined" the Batman franchise and scored a run away success where his predecessor, Tim Burton, had managed to screw "Batman" into the ground with his reimagining. There's been quite a lot of efforts done at "reimagning" some established franchise that have been done in ways which deliberately spurned the existing fan base and to many of those have been unmitigated disasters. Yet, being slavishly loyal to the existing fan base is no guarantee of success either.
In the case of this year's Star Trek, J.J. Abrams, has enough love for the original material (something Burton was on record as actually loathing with a passion) and also had enough awareness of the current zeitgeist to not only pull it off but to do so with outstanding success.
Specifically, he bases his Star Trek well into the timeline of the existing franchise. The days of Captain Archer's "Enterprise" are long since in the past and the United Federation of Planets is a well established organization and Star Fleet is a matured and ongoing affair. So, Klingons and Romulans are already known. And thus they're already familiar to us within the series. So to are all the main characters: Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scotty, Uhura, et. al. This allows us to quickly grasp the basics of the tale - but this is not some hackneyed retread.
Instead, Abrams has made things different. All of his characters are different. Quite similar to what we've already known but... different. And different not just to their no longer being portrayed by the same actors and actresses. Instead, the universe they are in is now different. Oh, it started out the same - hence the existence of Star Fleet, Kirk, Spock, etc., - but this particular Star Trek tale makes the change fairly early on.
Essentially, this Star Trek exists in an alternate universe from the other Star Treks we are familiar with. And yet, this alternate universe Star Trek is a fairly new thing. It got its start due to a singularity that got started in the future by the Spock we already know of. That's an inspired bit of plotting here as it now allows Abrams to use the stock characters, the stock settings, the stock backdrop, the stock universe, but now be free to make it his own.
And the tale is the better for it.
Thus we get the swaggering James T Kirk - but he's started from much more humble and painful origins. Thus we get the oh-so-logical Spock who gets to be far, far more human. And thus we get all the other characters we came to know and love over the years but now they're new and different. Uhura, for instance, is now Spock's love interest - and they act on it!
Oh, and there's no more planet Vulcan. Sorry about that.
This is a great and wonderful change. Handled right, this can provide many more decades of many more Star Trek tales. There'll be a facade of familiarity due to all its references to the past - and the homages here were exceptionally well done and almost entirely back to The Original Series - but everything else can be as new as the new writers and directors wish it to be. That bodes very, very well for the franchise.
Thus it's going to be a lot of fun for us fans!
I recommend this one highly. It's well worth watching even if you're not a major fan of Star Trek and if you are a major fan then it is even more worth watching.
Madoc
Long version: Go see it now!
Seriously. It is that good.
Okay, now that I got that established, lemme get to the details.
Beauty and I saw the Midnight showing of the latest Star Trek movie. We showed up around 9PM at the Century City mall in LA and were in line for the flick at about 10:30 or so on Thursday night and we got let in to the Imax theater at about 11. The movie started up just after Midnight. By that time the entire theater was sold out. We were packed in there surrounded by Trekkies, Trekkers, Star Trek fans, and geeks of all other stripes. Everyone there was enthused about the prospect of taking in this latest installment in the venerable Star Trek franchise.
And we were not disappointed.
This movie rocked from start to finish.
The production values were top notch, the acting was spot on, the script was very well written, and the plot held together quite nicely. The CGI was excellent and the cinematography in general was a treat to watch.
For anyone who had any doubts as to this latest Trek film being but a rehash of others or of the TV series you can set those doubts aside.
I've read a number of comments which portray this latest Star Trek film as being a "reboot" of the entire series / franchise and I think that's a pretty accurate description. The Star Trek franchise had essentially run itself dry and run itself into the ground. " The Original Series" (ST:TOS) TV show got reincarnated in a bigger and better fashion with a bigger and better Enterprise in "Star Trek: The Next Generation" (ST:TNG) and that had a spectacular run. When that ran out they then figured a way to tell the Star Trek tale whilst keeping the Enterprise anchored in place by turning it into a space station - this being "Star Trek: Deep Space 9" (ST:DS9) and even before that ran out they tried retelling the Star Trek tale by taking the Enterprise out of the Federation entirely - "Star Trek: Voyager" (ST:V) and when that failed they then tried telling the Star Trek tale by sending the Enterprise into the past with... well.. "Enterprise."
By this time there was really nothing left for them to do in the series. Go further into the future? Try a "Star Trek: The Next Next Generation?" Hmm... no. Go further into the past with a pre-Enterprise "Enterprise - the Prequel?" Hmm... no. So, what was left?
Simple. Pick a point in the known continuity of the franchise and change it from there forward. Make something entirely new out of the old stuff. Make it exactly the same - only different. And that's exactly what they did here.
There's risks with such things. Mucking about with icons is fraught with them. Some times it works - just look at how Nolan "reimagined" the Batman franchise and scored a run away success where his predecessor, Tim Burton, had managed to screw "Batman" into the ground with his reimagining. There's been quite a lot of efforts done at "reimagning" some established franchise that have been done in ways which deliberately spurned the existing fan base and to many of those have been unmitigated disasters. Yet, being slavishly loyal to the existing fan base is no guarantee of success either.
In the case of this year's Star Trek, J.J. Abrams, has enough love for the original material (something Burton was on record as actually loathing with a passion) and also had enough awareness of the current zeitgeist to not only pull it off but to do so with outstanding success.
Specifically, he bases his Star Trek well into the timeline of the existing franchise. The days of Captain Archer's "Enterprise" are long since in the past and the United Federation of Planets is a well established organization and Star Fleet is a matured and ongoing affair. So, Klingons and Romulans are already known. And thus they're already familiar to us within the series. So to are all the main characters: Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scotty, Uhura, et. al. This allows us to quickly grasp the basics of the tale - but this is not some hackneyed retread.
Instead, Abrams has made things different. All of his characters are different. Quite similar to what we've already known but... different. And different not just to their no longer being portrayed by the same actors and actresses. Instead, the universe they are in is now different. Oh, it started out the same - hence the existence of Star Fleet, Kirk, Spock, etc., - but this particular Star Trek tale makes the change fairly early on.
Essentially, this Star Trek exists in an alternate universe from the other Star Treks we are familiar with. And yet, this alternate universe Star Trek is a fairly new thing. It got its start due to a singularity that got started in the future by the Spock we already know of. That's an inspired bit of plotting here as it now allows Abrams to use the stock characters, the stock settings, the stock backdrop, the stock universe, but now be free to make it his own.
And the tale is the better for it.
Thus we get the swaggering James T Kirk - but he's started from much more humble and painful origins. Thus we get the oh-so-logical Spock who gets to be far, far more human. And thus we get all the other characters we came to know and love over the years but now they're new and different. Uhura, for instance, is now Spock's love interest - and they act on it!
Oh, and there's no more planet Vulcan. Sorry about that.
This is a great and wonderful change. Handled right, this can provide many more decades of many more Star Trek tales. There'll be a facade of familiarity due to all its references to the past - and the homages here were exceptionally well done and almost entirely back to The Original Series - but everything else can be as new as the new writers and directors wish it to be. That bodes very, very well for the franchise.
Thus it's going to be a lot of fun for us fans!
I recommend this one highly. It's well worth watching even if you're not a major fan of Star Trek and if you are a major fan then it is even more worth watching.
Madoc