Star Trek Options

[Aaron]

Really good movie. I can't call it 'great' until I see it more than once.

I'm fairly into Star Trek - seen all the movies, all of the TV series - but have never gone to conventions, dressed up as a Romulan or learned Klingon.

I think the casting was superb, all of the main characters were cast perfectly.

There were a few things in the movie that struck me, as a Star Trek fan, oddly, but it didn't take away from the movie.

I felt at first like the main villain was underused, more something to move the story along than anything else, but then I recognized that the main conflict in this movie is between Kirk and Spock, not Good Guys vs. Villain.

I'll be seeing it again this weekend.

[THECHICKEN]

Just saw it.... wow


what an unnessesary movie. Throw in special effects and unnessary bullshit (who's good at hand to hand combat? ... cuz though you have phasers and ample time to use them, we'll need to introduce a retarded sword fight). The story makes no sense (besides the kirk's timeline change at very start when enemy comes through, the rest of the story of creating the "alternate universe" for JJ to play in, could have been done in a more believable way). The romulans didn't look like romulans, and the bad guys were boring in general... even with a wannabe Spock/Khan yell. The reason for them being bad guys just didn't do it for me.

Characters were VERY well casted (chekov was only one i might change), and i loved the acting... but story line BLEW. Acting good, storyline on par with ... Nemesis maybe. Well at least now maybe they can get some good stories written for this awesome new cast (simon peg lolol) and I can enjoy other movies. Oh and the eating an apple... really?

[Aaron]

Just saw it.... wow


what an unnessesary movie. Throw in special effects and unnessary bullshit (who's good at hand to hand combat? ... cuz though you have phasers and ample time to use them, we'll need to introduce a retarded sword fight). The story makes no sense (besides the kirk's timeline change at very start when enemy comes through, the rest of the story of creating the "alternate universe" for JJ to play in, could have been done in a more believable way). The romulans didn't look like romulans, and the bad guys were boring in general... even with a wannabe Spock/Khan yell. The reason for them being bad guys just didn't do it for me.

Characters were VERY well casted (chekov was only one i might change), and i loved the acting... but story line BLEW. Acting good, storyline on par with ... Nemesis maybe. Well at least now maybe they can get some good stories written for this awesome new cast (simon peg lolol) and I can enjoy other movies. Oh and the eating an apple... really?

The plot is nowhere near as tight as it should have been, no question. I do not disagree with you at all here. It was mentioned in the movie that the Narada was a mining vessel, but aside from the drilling platform, it might as well have been a warship. I mean, you say 'mining vessel' and I think clunky, boxy, very few weapons, etc.

Where did Nero go for 25 years between destroying the Kelvin and capturing Spock? Surely somebody would have noticed them.

Unless the star that went supernova is the one that Romulus orbits, it should not have been threatened by it at all. I'm no physicist, but if some distant star goes supernova, it might douse us with radiation but it's not going to roll through our solar system all dramatic like and blow the planet apart.

Further, to neutralize the supernova, Spock was going to toss the red matter into the 'center' of the supernova. Uh... a supernova is an explosion, with (presumably) a shockwave that expands from that point on. There is no center.

As far as red matter goes, if that little teency bit was enough to neutralize the supernova, where was the logic of putting a shit ton of it on the ship?

There's lots more.

Couple of notes, though... as far as the Romulans not looking like Romulans, aside from cosmetic differences (more on that in a sec), they looked pretty much identical to Vulcans. Which, since they share a common ancestry, is not a big stretch. The cosmetic differences, the facial tattoos and mangled ears, were explained in the officially sanctioned countdown comic to be Romulan symbols of mourning. That was never explained in the movie, though.

Kirk eating an apple during the Kobayashi Maru scene was a nod to the Trek fans. Kirk was eating an apple in Star Trek II when he was telling Saavik how he beat the test.

Ultimately, I will judge this film based on the sequel. Abrams accomplished the three things with this movie that I thought he absolutely had to get done:
1) The film has been commercially successful enough to where a sequel has been or soon will be given the greenlight.

2) The casting, as you noted, was perfect. George Lucas didn't even have to recast anybody for his Star Wars prequels, and look how much shit he got over some of those casting choices. No one is questioning Abrams' choices, they were all spot on.

3) Attract an audience of people who have not been Trek fans in the past, get them interested in the characters and the universe. This was more of an action movie set in the Star Trek universe than it was a Star Trek movie. I certainly don't expect for there to be a significant number of people who weren't fans the first time to go back and revisit The Original Series or The Next Generation, etc. But when the next movie comes out, they'll go see it. If they come out with a TV show, they'll probably give it a shot.