We boldly went.
Yesterday marked the 6th time I've seen a Star Trek movie on its first day, or one of the first showings. All the way back to 1989, when my parents pulled me out of school to go see Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (What a mistake that was!)
So this is a tradition in my life. To the expense of everything around me, I'll go see these movies on the first day, as close to the first screening as possible.
So Regal Fenway was running two advanced screenings before the midnight show yesterday. We caught the 9:50. Despite my anxiety about getting there early, we did indeed get great seats and the theater wasn't nearly as crowded as I thought it would be. Jess put up with my shenanigans and we ended up having a great time.
So, after four years, the wait was finally over. My opinion of the movie, as a grizzled Star Trek veteran, was that it was great, but not mindblowing. Its a quality movie, but I came away with one nagging thought: 'If this is what Star Trek is going to be from now on, thank god for the stuff that came before.'
(As I have been advised by the wonderful Jessface to notify readers, there be major spoilers ahead)
That might make it sound like I didn't like the movie. That's not true. I loved it. I loved it for what it is, and what it was trying to do, which was re-invent the series. But I also felt a sense of revisionist history going on. In my mind, there was not enough respect paid to the original series, or Star Trek in general. I kept thinking 'wait, this is Star Trek, isn't it?'
I mean, there were plenty of errors. For example, Spock gets in a turbo lift on the shuttle bay and in a couple of seconds, he's on the bridge. Super-fast turbolifts? Editing for time? It was a seamless shot that took far too little time. Another big one that didn't make any sense was the viewscreens. Now I know this is a nitpick, but its a big one. Federation Starships do not have windows on their bridges. Even Enterprise NX-01 from Enterprise had a viewscreen. The USS Kelvin, the ship from the beginning, is technically more advanced than the NX class, but it has a window. A WINDOW. Sure it had nifty overlays and graphics and shit, but it is a Viewscreen, not a window. It should never be a window. Now what was cool was that this window allowed for a very cool sense of scale, since you could see the saucer section and the parallax change as the camera changed angles. Nice work ILM.
Also, Nero's disruption of the timeline does not explain why the new 'Original' Enterprise is so much different from the one we all know and love. Klingon Battlecruisers are not called 'warbirds' (that's the ROMULAN Warbird, J.J.) Phasers don't fire like machine guns (except for the pulse phasers on the Defiant). And photon torpedoes are red, not white. I mean, these are the little things that make the universe what it is. And, they're the kinds of things that us trekkies DO pick up on, AND they're also those kinds of things that wouldn't be that hard to get right, while at the same time, are very easy to ignore and change.
So I kinda felt like some of it was Star Trek-like and some parts weren't. Honestly, I didn't mind the recasting of the crew. I thought the casting was very good indeed, and I was comfortable with the characters by the end of the movie. But one disappointment was how fast everything was. This was one hell of a frenetic movie. There was never a quiet moment and it kinda felt like there was a much bigger story to tell. That sort of editing left the Kelvin crew pretty underserved. I did like the sort of gravity that Captain Robau commanded on his ship. The Kelvin was actually what made me feel the most at home, like that was the Star Trek I've always known and loved, with a few twists, if the rest of the movie had felt like this, I would've been less conflicted.
I loved this movie for what it was, but that is to say, I didn't like some of the directions they took. I wanted it to feel familiar, but it didn't. But, that sort of thing is good. I like this new universe, even if it feels like its a Fan-fic in some ways.
That's what I told Jess last night. I like this new direction, I like the fact that this continuity can explore a new universe. However, I also very much like the fact that they did not overwrite the existing continuity. This movie, in no way, invalidates TOS, the ten films, TNG, DS9 and VOY. And in part, I'm glad. Whenever I feel uncomfortable with this new Trek, I can always watch The Motion Picture again and feel right back at home, and not feel like 'oh wait, I can't enjoy this anymore, since it never really happened in the universe.'
At the end of the day, I need to see this movie again. I've gotten all the nitpicks out of the way, so I can really enjoy it for what it is. I also think that this movie set up what is sure to be a very good run of new movies and possibly even a new television series. Now that they've established this alternate universe, let's let it live and breathe a little, and let our characters live in it.
Note to JJ Abrams: Pay attention to the little stuff. get the next movie closer to the Trek we've always known. We want to see warp cores and Andorians, not CGI alien dudes and factories. Also, give us a little more faithful 'going to warp' effect. I didn't mind the new 'traveling at warp speed effect', but a ship just snapping forward like that was too quick. AND, Starships are NEVER EVER supposed to go to warp in a star system, except for that one time, with the Defiant, and the Phoenix, and NX-01, and about a thousand other examples. But still, you shouldn't do it. Oh, and red Bussard Collectors. That one is a no-brainer, and a cardinal sin committed by the design team. Get that one right next time. Just say the Enterprise went in for an overhaul, and got new engines.
A little technical post-script. At the end, the Enterprise did not jettison her warp drive, like it was stated. A warp core is a single piece of technology, not the multiple objects we saw. Those things must've been the antimatter storage pods. Detonating those would've provided a significant punch, probably enough to push the Enterprise out of the way of the nasty death-hole. Enterprise could've then limped away at impulse and radioed for help. Thankfully, the Enterprise was not hijacked by klingons during this down-time, as there would've been no way to self-destruct the ship with those nasty Pa'taQs on board!
So this is a tradition in my life. To the expense of everything around me, I'll go see these movies on the first day, as close to the first screening as possible.
So Regal Fenway was running two advanced screenings before the midnight show yesterday. We caught the 9:50. Despite my anxiety about getting there early, we did indeed get great seats and the theater wasn't nearly as crowded as I thought it would be. Jess put up with my shenanigans and we ended up having a great time.
So, after four years, the wait was finally over. My opinion of the movie, as a grizzled Star Trek veteran, was that it was great, but not mindblowing. Its a quality movie, but I came away with one nagging thought: 'If this is what Star Trek is going to be from now on, thank god for the stuff that came before.'
(As I have been advised by the wonderful Jessface to notify readers, there be major spoilers ahead)
That might make it sound like I didn't like the movie. That's not true. I loved it. I loved it for what it is, and what it was trying to do, which was re-invent the series. But I also felt a sense of revisionist history going on. In my mind, there was not enough respect paid to the original series, or Star Trek in general. I kept thinking 'wait, this is Star Trek, isn't it?'
I mean, there were plenty of errors. For example, Spock gets in a turbo lift on the shuttle bay and in a couple of seconds, he's on the bridge. Super-fast turbolifts? Editing for time? It was a seamless shot that took far too little time. Another big one that didn't make any sense was the viewscreens. Now I know this is a nitpick, but its a big one. Federation Starships do not have windows on their bridges. Even Enterprise NX-01 from Enterprise had a viewscreen. The USS Kelvin, the ship from the beginning, is technically more advanced than the NX class, but it has a window. A WINDOW. Sure it had nifty overlays and graphics and shit, but it is a Viewscreen, not a window. It should never be a window. Now what was cool was that this window allowed for a very cool sense of scale, since you could see the saucer section and the parallax change as the camera changed angles. Nice work ILM.
Also, Nero's disruption of the timeline does not explain why the new 'Original' Enterprise is so much different from the one we all know and love. Klingon Battlecruisers are not called 'warbirds' (that's the ROMULAN Warbird, J.J.) Phasers don't fire like machine guns (except for the pulse phasers on the Defiant). And photon torpedoes are red, not white. I mean, these are the little things that make the universe what it is. And, they're the kinds of things that us trekkies DO pick up on, AND they're also those kinds of things that wouldn't be that hard to get right, while at the same time, are very easy to ignore and change.
So I kinda felt like some of it was Star Trek-like and some parts weren't. Honestly, I didn't mind the recasting of the crew. I thought the casting was very good indeed, and I was comfortable with the characters by the end of the movie. But one disappointment was how fast everything was. This was one hell of a frenetic movie. There was never a quiet moment and it kinda felt like there was a much bigger story to tell. That sort of editing left the Kelvin crew pretty underserved. I did like the sort of gravity that Captain Robau commanded on his ship. The Kelvin was actually what made me feel the most at home, like that was the Star Trek I've always known and loved, with a few twists, if the rest of the movie had felt like this, I would've been less conflicted.
I loved this movie for what it was, but that is to say, I didn't like some of the directions they took. I wanted it to feel familiar, but it didn't. But, that sort of thing is good. I like this new universe, even if it feels like its a Fan-fic in some ways.
That's what I told Jess last night. I like this new direction, I like the fact that this continuity can explore a new universe. However, I also very much like the fact that they did not overwrite the existing continuity. This movie, in no way, invalidates TOS, the ten films, TNG, DS9 and VOY. And in part, I'm glad. Whenever I feel uncomfortable with this new Trek, I can always watch The Motion Picture again and feel right back at home, and not feel like 'oh wait, I can't enjoy this anymore, since it never really happened in the universe.'
At the end of the day, I need to see this movie again. I've gotten all the nitpicks out of the way, so I can really enjoy it for what it is. I also think that this movie set up what is sure to be a very good run of new movies and possibly even a new television series. Now that they've established this alternate universe, let's let it live and breathe a little, and let our characters live in it.
Note to JJ Abrams: Pay attention to the little stuff. get the next movie closer to the Trek we've always known. We want to see warp cores and Andorians, not CGI alien dudes and factories. Also, give us a little more faithful 'going to warp' effect. I didn't mind the new 'traveling at warp speed effect', but a ship just snapping forward like that was too quick. AND, Starships are NEVER EVER supposed to go to warp in a star system, except for that one time, with the Defiant, and the Phoenix, and NX-01, and about a thousand other examples. But still, you shouldn't do it. Oh, and red Bussard Collectors. That one is a no-brainer, and a cardinal sin committed by the design team. Get that one right next time. Just say the Enterprise went in for an overhaul, and got new engines.
A little technical post-script. At the end, the Enterprise did not jettison her warp drive, like it was stated. A warp core is a single piece of technology, not the multiple objects we saw. Those things must've been the antimatter storage pods. Detonating those would've provided a significant punch, probably enough to push the Enterprise out of the way of the nasty death-hole. Enterprise could've then limped away at impulse and radioed for help. Thankfully, the Enterprise was not hijacked by klingons during this down-time, as there would've been no way to self-destruct the ship with those nasty Pa'taQs on board!