***Warning: there are a few small spoilers in this review***
Zach's Take
Last weekend Priya and I finally got to see the new StarTrek movie. We had been wanting to watch it since it first came out but we just
hadn't had the time yet. Both of us enjoyed the first one and had high hopes
for the second one.
So here’s the overall gist of the movie. Kirk loses command
of the Enterprise because he violated the prime directive by interfering with
natural events on a planet to save a primitive civilization.
Meanwhile on Earth a London
Star-fleet building that keeps top secret information is blown-up. After the
bombing all the Star-fleet admirals and captains gather at headquarters in San
Francisco when John Harrison – a Star-fleet agent – shows up and opens fire. Admiral
Pike, the man who convinced Kirk to first join Star Fleet, is killed in this
attack. Harrison escapes and Kirk is
given back command of the Enterprise by Admiral Marcus and commanded to hunt
down Harrison and kill him, which Kirk is eager to do so he can avenge Admiral
Pike’s death. Marcus arms him with a mass of new state of the art photon
torpedoes and sends him on his way.
Harrison goes to a deserted region of Kronos , the Klingon
home world. This is a dangerous place because at this point in time the
Klingons and the Federation are enemies. Kirk is supposed to get within range
of Harrison’s location and just fire the undetectable torpedoes at Harrison
rather than attempting to capture him. During the journey to Kronos Spock and
others convince Kirk that it is immoral to simply kill Harrison before he’s
been on trial so Kirk decides not to fire the torpedoes without first
attempting to apprehend Harrison.
Once there, Kirk, Spock and Uhura set out to capture Harrison but are intercepted by Klingons. Harrison comes
in and kills all the Klingons almost single-handedly saving Kirk, Spock and
Uhura then he surprisingly surrenders to them after learning of the torpedoes
aimed at him. Returning to the Enterprise , Harrison
reveals his true identity as Khan - a genetically
engineered superhuman who was awakened from a 300-year-long period of suspended
animation by Admiral Marcus. Marcus had
been using Khan to develop new weapons for a war that he believed was
inevitable between the Federation and the Klingon Empire. The torpedoes, which Khan
designed, are found to each contain a cryogenic pod holding one of Khan's crew
inside who Marcus had been holding hostage in order to control Khan.
From this point on Kirk and his crew have to deal not only
with Khan but also Marcus as an adversary. With Khan and Marcus pitted against
one another Kirk must now figure out how to thwart both of their plans, Marcus
from starting a war with the Klingons and Khan from attacking Earth for
vengeance against Marcus and the Federation.
Now overall I really enjoyed the movie. The effects were
great, the story was fairly solid and the movie didn't seem to drag at any
point. But there were some things that they chose to do which seemed needless.
First they found a way to get Leonard Nimoy as old Spock into the movie just
like they did with the last one. While I thought it made sense in the last one
in this one it seemed repetitive and needless for the advancement of the story.
Everything new Spock did after talking to old Spock he could have done by
himself. Also the origins of Khan himself were somewhat vague. The fact that he
is some sort of superhuman that was genetically engineered over 300 years ago
was odd because this Star Trek is occurring around the year 2260 so a person
genetically engineered 300 years earlier would have been made in the 1960s.
Basically Khan has already been made or is being made right around now and I’m
not sure how that is supposed to make sense. How can we create some superhuman
like Khan with all these powers of healing, strength and expansive knowledge of
space travel and engineering when we don’t have any of that information
ourselves yet?
I was also a bit disappointed with what a minor role the
Klingons played in this movie. I think it is difficult for Star Trek fans to go
backwards and to think of Klingons as our enemies since they have been our
friends since the 1980s in Star Trek the Next Generation but at this point in
Star Trek history they are our enemies and I wanted the movie to dive deeper
into that rather than have a bad Admiral be the major source of conflict. Now
they certainly set it up so future Star Trek movies can go into that topic,
which I hope they do but I just wanted more of it now.
Despite some of these criticisms I really liked this movie
and it is one I certainly would like to add to my own personal collection of
DVDs. It’s a great action/sci-fi movie that comes with lots of thrills and
leaves you wanting more. I would rate this movie a 7.5 out of 10.
Priya’s Take
My two cents: Hello!
So I thought I’d give my thoughts too on the movie since Zach said he’s happy
to let me tag on to the end of this blog. Yes, I am a Trekkie, I love the TV
series and the new as well as original movies. The issue Zach brings up about
the history of Khan is answered in these, but I agree for newer fans it would
have been worth going over a little (but I suppose they will develop that story
as the franchise continues).
But for those wanting
a quick brief on him (and to answer Zach’s point about him being engineered in
the 60s) here you go – Khan controlled a large part of Earth during the
Eugenics War in the 90s (so being engineered 30 years prior makes sense). He is
exiled by Kirk almost 300 years later when he’s awoken from suspended animation
and tries to overthrow the Enterprise and starts a new society with his people.
Khan escapes some years later and seeks revenge on Kirk.
So on to Star Trek:
Into Darkness. Overall I really enjoyed this movie. The sound effects were
brilliant (well worth watching in the theatre if you can) and the special
effects were also fantastic. The CGI wasn’t overdone (which I can find
distracting if it is… think of the most recent Star Wars). The warp scenes were
especially good – the warp sound seems to have been modified since the last
movie as well as the ‘dust trail’ it leaves behind when the Enterprise
The story itself is
pretty good. Predictable at times with a few jokes that are overworked and
overused (many are the same as in the first movie). Like Zach I didn’t see the
point of Leonard Nimoy being in the movie beside the cameo factor to please
serious fans of the original show. If they were going with cameos, George Tekai
would be a great one though I have no idea how they could work him in.
Admittedly I was quite excited when Nimoy first came on screen but was
disappointed when it turned out that he had no real purpose to the story. Had
he been doing something significant I think the cameo would have been much
better.
The development of the
characters since the last movie was ok – actually they haven’t changed much. I
would have liked to see more of Sulu and Bones instead of being relegated to
slightly more than a side role, but far less than a main role. Bones still had
the same one liners as the first movie which gave a sense that not much thought
went into his character development other than him being Kirk’s nagging crew
mate. Chekov got a little more air time, but not enough which is a shame because
I think Anton Yelchin is a very talented actor, it would have been nice to see
more of this on screen. Still, on the whole the characters were developed
enough to move the story along and get to the point which I guess is the aim of
this type of movie. You’re not going to walk away feeling like you know them
any better or were even part of what’s going on (so many good action movies are
good for precisely this reason, think any of the Indiana Jones movies, except
the fourth one maybe – you really got to know Indy, whatever he felt, you
felt). Still, you will feel like you've seen a good movie because there’s
enough going on to keep you entertained.
The only distraction I
had was that the guy who plays Marcus is the same guy that played Robocop
(Peter Weller) and I couldn't help thinking of that every time he was on
screen! Does that ever happen to you?
Whether or not you’re
a Star Trek fan you’ll enjoy this movie. You needn't know anything about
previous Star Trek stuff making space, the final frontier, accessible to any
and all.
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