Star Trek Into Darkness...
I know that nobody is on here anymore, but I have a lot of feels that I need to discuss. I'll put them under a cut because SPOILERS. SPOILERS EVERYWHERE. LOTS AND LOTS OF SPOILERS.
Oh. My. Heart.
I have read tons of fan reactions and I'm baffled because how is it that I am the only one who was absolutely gutted by Pike's death? Seriously, seconds before he got shot by Harrison I had hissed, "They'd better not kill him!" and when they did, I was literally sitting there silently weeping while the person I was with patted my back comfortingly. I felt like an idiot for crying, but I loved Pike; I loved the relationship between Kirk and Pike, and it broke my heart that Kirk lost another father so brutally. Killing him off was a brave move by JJ, and although it was probably the right move for the story, it was just so painful to watch. Then Kirk's reaction was even more emotions-wrecking. (My sister didn't see it coming, but since I'd been to see it the night before I was ready with tissues for her. I wanted so badly to say, "keep it at hand, you'll need it again.")
Something else painful to watch was Kirk's death scene. Now, I knew he wouldn't stay dead because I saw Wrath of Khan and I remembered the scene with Bones & the tribble, but when Kirk croaked out, "I'm scared, Spock." I fricken teared up again. To my relief, there were sniffles ALL OVER the theater, so I wasn't alone in letting my emotions get away from me despite knowing what was coming. :-P
Also, can we talk for a moment about Chris Pine's acting skills? Because I've always liked him, but his range of emotions in this movie were probably the best I'd ever seen out of him. His highly realistic delivery of his lines in the movie made them seem unscripted and made the whole theater laugh, gasp and cry. And since I'm extoling his virtues, I have to say that I did not like Quinto's 2009 Spock but he totally changed that in this movie. I think Quinto was more comfortable with being Spock in this movie, and the interplay between Pine/Quinto (and Urban/Pine...and Urban/Quinto for that matter...) was utterly fantastic. Also, I loved Pine's ineractions with Pegg. I seriously love this cast, and their fondness for each other shown through in this movie.
One of the big complaints is that they recycled an old storyline. One of the biggest complaints about 2009 was that they didn't recycle an old storyline and made it too much of an AU. So really, JJ was damned either way. And while they did recycle Khan, I think they did it in a way that was particularly well done, and that Cumberbatch was the perfect choice to play Khan. And I don't really particularly care for Cumberbatch.
As an aside, all the people bitching that Khan was "too white" can take a leap. If JJ had made the villain a person who wasn't white, he would have been slayed for 'villainizing' non-white people. Again, it was a no win for him. Cumberbatch was incredible as Khan, so that should be what matters, not the color of his skin. Also, Montelban was as close to white as a Hispanic person gets, so it's kind of an invalid argument. Some people just go looking for controversy when there really, really isn't any.
The other complaint seems to be about the very brief flash of Alice Eve in her bra and panties. Yes, it was a totally pointless scene, I agree, however, the same people who are complaining about her showing her body are the ones who reblog pics of Pine in his underwear from ST 2009 and who are currently reblogging pics of the wetsuits that left nothing to the imagination from STID with comments like "best scene evarrrr!" under them. Why is it only 'sexist' when it's women showing skin? This is the same argument I make when people complain about Marvel and their 'sexist' movie costumes 'exploiting women'. Really? Because I'm pretty sure Peggy was a total badass in Captain America and she never once flashed a bit of skin as opposed to Cap who emerged shirtless from the serum chamber. Ditto for Jane Foster, she used her brains to be a strong female character. And Avengers was rife with men in skin tight pleather, Captain America in yoga pants, and Hawkeye's arms on full display and they weren't complaining about those things. Yeah, Widow's uniform was tight, but it was the same as Loki, Cap, Thor, and Hawkeye, and Widow's top stayed zipped up the entire move. When you're a blatant hypocrite, your argument is invalid, thankyouverymuch. Uh, the tl;dr of that rant is: I was totally fine with her showing her body, I just wish it had been done in a scene that actually made sense in the plot. (See also: the brief scene with the Catian women in Kirk's bed - it was a total waste of time, and I'm totally handwaving that scene away. It didn't happen.)
I loved the character development we got to see with everyone, especially that Kirk wasn't suddenly the perfect Captain who does everything right, but I really wish (like I did in 2009) that we got a little more Chekov (and Sulu because I'm greedy like that). Chekov got one of the more important moments in the movie, but I'll admit, I whispered out "NOOOOOOOOOO!" when Kirk told him to go put on a red shirt. I honestly thought he was at risk.
Alright, that's my ranting for now. We're going to see it in 3D on Wednesday to celebrate Traci's birthday so I'll probably come back and ramble more after my third viewing of it.
If you haven't seen it, you very much should - it's a great ride.
For what it's worth, if you like superhero movies, Iron Man 3 is totally worth the price of admission. It had a few twists that I didn't see coming, and some really great moments. Also, if you see it, you'll smile whenever you see Dora the Explorer from then on. :-P
Oh. My. Heart.
I have read tons of fan reactions and I'm baffled because how is it that I am the only one who was absolutely gutted by Pike's death? Seriously, seconds before he got shot by Harrison I had hissed, "They'd better not kill him!" and when they did, I was literally sitting there silently weeping while the person I was with patted my back comfortingly. I felt like an idiot for crying, but I loved Pike; I loved the relationship between Kirk and Pike, and it broke my heart that Kirk lost another father so brutally. Killing him off was a brave move by JJ, and although it was probably the right move for the story, it was just so painful to watch. Then Kirk's reaction was even more emotions-wrecking. (My sister didn't see it coming, but since I'd been to see it the night before I was ready with tissues for her. I wanted so badly to say, "keep it at hand, you'll need it again.")
Something else painful to watch was Kirk's death scene. Now, I knew he wouldn't stay dead because I saw Wrath of Khan and I remembered the scene with Bones & the tribble, but when Kirk croaked out, "I'm scared, Spock." I fricken teared up again. To my relief, there were sniffles ALL OVER the theater, so I wasn't alone in letting my emotions get away from me despite knowing what was coming. :-P
Also, can we talk for a moment about Chris Pine's acting skills? Because I've always liked him, but his range of emotions in this movie were probably the best I'd ever seen out of him. His highly realistic delivery of his lines in the movie made them seem unscripted and made the whole theater laugh, gasp and cry. And since I'm extoling his virtues, I have to say that I did not like Quinto's 2009 Spock but he totally changed that in this movie. I think Quinto was more comfortable with being Spock in this movie, and the interplay between Pine/Quinto (and Urban/Pine...and Urban/Quinto for that matter...) was utterly fantastic. Also, I loved Pine's ineractions with Pegg. I seriously love this cast, and their fondness for each other shown through in this movie.
One of the big complaints is that they recycled an old storyline. One of the biggest complaints about 2009 was that they didn't recycle an old storyline and made it too much of an AU. So really, JJ was damned either way. And while they did recycle Khan, I think they did it in a way that was particularly well done, and that Cumberbatch was the perfect choice to play Khan. And I don't really particularly care for Cumberbatch.
As an aside, all the people bitching that Khan was "too white" can take a leap. If JJ had made the villain a person who wasn't white, he would have been slayed for 'villainizing' non-white people. Again, it was a no win for him. Cumberbatch was incredible as Khan, so that should be what matters, not the color of his skin. Also, Montelban was as close to white as a Hispanic person gets, so it's kind of an invalid argument. Some people just go looking for controversy when there really, really isn't any.
The other complaint seems to be about the very brief flash of Alice Eve in her bra and panties. Yes, it was a totally pointless scene, I agree, however, the same people who are complaining about her showing her body are the ones who reblog pics of Pine in his underwear from ST 2009 and who are currently reblogging pics of the wetsuits that left nothing to the imagination from STID with comments like "best scene evarrrr!" under them. Why is it only 'sexist' when it's women showing skin? This is the same argument I make when people complain about Marvel and their 'sexist' movie costumes 'exploiting women'. Really? Because I'm pretty sure Peggy was a total badass in Captain America and she never once flashed a bit of skin as opposed to Cap who emerged shirtless from the serum chamber. Ditto for Jane Foster, she used her brains to be a strong female character. And Avengers was rife with men in skin tight pleather, Captain America in yoga pants, and Hawkeye's arms on full display and they weren't complaining about those things. Yeah, Widow's uniform was tight, but it was the same as Loki, Cap, Thor, and Hawkeye, and Widow's top stayed zipped up the entire move. When you're a blatant hypocrite, your argument is invalid, thankyouverymuch. Uh, the tl;dr of that rant is: I was totally fine with her showing her body, I just wish it had been done in a scene that actually made sense in the plot. (See also: the brief scene with the Catian women in Kirk's bed - it was a total waste of time, and I'm totally handwaving that scene away. It didn't happen.)
I loved the character development we got to see with everyone, especially that Kirk wasn't suddenly the perfect Captain who does everything right, but I really wish (like I did in 2009) that we got a little more Chekov (and Sulu because I'm greedy like that). Chekov got one of the more important moments in the movie, but I'll admit, I whispered out "NOOOOOOOOOO!" when Kirk told him to go put on a red shirt. I honestly thought he was at risk.
Alright, that's my ranting for now. We're going to see it in 3D on Wednesday to celebrate Traci's birthday so I'll probably come back and ramble more after my third viewing of it.
If you haven't seen it, you very much should - it's a great ride.
For what it's worth, if you like superhero movies, Iron Man 3 is totally worth the price of admission. It had a few twists that I didn't see coming, and some really great moments. Also, if you see it, you'll smile whenever you see Dora the Explorer from then on. :-P