Star Trek Discussion Thread For Those Who Have Seen It - WITH SPOILERS
 

I hate farting around with the spoiler button, so consider this thread to be one big spoiler. If you haven't seen the movie and want to, stop reading now.


You have been warned.





So, what did you like, or not like? What annoyed you?

Mainly I really enjoyed it. I liked the cast and the ship. Special effects were great. Nimoy was awesome.

Some things that bothered me:

1. I thought Nero was a weak villain. Also, are we really supposed to believe that they just sat there waiting for Spock for 25 years? That's the single dumbest aspect of the movie. Were they playing cards? Knitting? That was dumb. Of course, Star Trek is generally good for a couple of head-scratchers like that.

2. Rather convenient that Scott just happened to be stationed on the ice planet. That was lame. But I do like the way Pegg portrays him.

3. I still can't quite believe they destroyed Vulcan. That's.... damn. I guess we won't be getting a remake of Amok Time.

Yeah, the whole destrcution of Vulcan really makes me question this one more than anything else. How does that fit in the Star Trek cannon?

Well, at the end Spock did say that the survivors were forming a new colony, so I guess they can pass that off as Vulcan.

But the old canon is out the window now. They can do anything or kill off anybody they want to. And of course Kirk is now captain of the Enterprise at age 25 instead of age 34, so that gives them an even wider berth.

I guess that was another thing that bothered me - yeah, he saved Earth, but giving a kid with 3 years enlisted experience command of a ship? Again, I know they had to get the ball rolling, but....

And I hope the next one has Klingons and more one-on-one ship battles.

You know I really didn't even think about that watching the movie...I guess I just expected him to Captain Kirk in the end.

Over all I really enjoyed the movie and it reminded me why we still have theaters as this was the first time in a long time I felt I hadn't wasted my time or money.

I hope Terminator can hold it's own but until it comes out I would expect Trek to make a killing in the next couple of weeks.

Nero reminded of a villain you would see in the next generation series. I suppose they could have made him a little more sinister but I overall liked the fact they concentrated on the main characters instead.

Nero was very disappointing. They just didn't even bother with his backstory or anything else that would make you care about him. Very flat character for a super villain. Some of the best super villains are characters you can sorta relate to, but they didn't give us anything with Nero.

The entire "Abandon Kirk on the ice world, conveniently run into Future Spock in an ice cave, more conveniently run into Scotty, beam Kirk and Scotty back to Enterprise" part was probably the most irritating.

And if they kicked Kirk off the ship for insubordination, how is it that he can sneak his way back onto the ship, trick Spock, and get his position right back after breaking the rules? His position in the chain of command should have been voided when he got into trouble...

The relationship between Spock and Uhura bothered me too. I'm not sure exactly why.

You needed to pick up the graphic novel/glorified comic book to get Nero's backstory. Knowing that it made his character a bit more understandable, but not much.

And personally, I liked the Spock/Uhura thing, because it surprised me. The commercials led us to believe that it was Kirk and Uhura that would hook up. Nice bait and switch on Abrams' part. :D

how did vulcan go kapoot?

The bad guy created a black hole at the planet's core. They show it in one of the commercials.

I loved the Spock/Uhura thing. I never thought I'd say this in a million years, but... Spock was dead sexy.

I thought it was awesome. And I'm not somebody that thought they could ever pull it off.

Even when Nimoy was onscreen with Quinto, there wasn't a moment in the movie where I thought "this isn't Kirk, Spock, Bones, Uhura, Scotty, Sulu, Chekov, et al". They were who they were, and it never distracted. Quinto in particular surprised me, I don't like him as Syler, but he pulled this role off as well as anyone could have. And Chris Pine is Kirk now. Hell, he was Kirk the first second he was onscreen. Maybe not exactly the same Kirk as Shatner, but he's Kirk in this alternate reality they created.

The action was great, but there were some very moving scenes, giving the film an emotional core.

The only weakness for me were the events in the future. I didn't/don't plan to read the graphic novel, and although I know they had it all planned out, the destruction of Romulus and the conflict between Nero and Classic Spock just felt like an afterthought that they didn't put a whole lot of effort into. Which is where I think the motivational problems with Nero come from. And the convenient placement of Spock and Scotty on the ice planet irked me minutely (along with the rock ewok). But even with that, I think the movie was great. Not good. Great. So good I'm going to see it again.

Oh, and the part at the end when Kirk gets his commission, they lost a number of ships (and captains), and he did prove his muster in combat. I looked at it as accepting his field promotion to first officer, and then he slid into the chair after Pike's promotion. Maybe pushing it, but hey, it's what we wanted to see at the end of the movie, Kirk in the Captain's chair on the Enterprise.

Don't get me wrong - I really enjoyed the movie. The stuff they got right far outweighed the plot holes and stupid shit.

The whole time travel aspect killed the whole story for me and the fact that they trivialized it only did further damage. To a ST outsider like me, it's an enjoyable flick and that's about it.

The thing that saved the time travel aspect, was that they didn't travel back in time to the same reality. When they went through the black hole, they entered an alternate reality. (This was covered briefly in that scene on the bridge.) In this way it doesn't wreck continuity. It lets them reboot in the context of the rest of the films and shows.

Just watched it and enjoyed it. I loved the characters and people cast in the roles of the old crew.

Maybe I'm slow here...but how did Nero know where/WHEN to find Spock? If I'm understanding this...the mining ship with Nero AND Spock and his little ship get sucked through the singularity and the mining ship gets transported back in time (thus the alternate time line)...but Spock comes out 25 years later in that same alternate time line? Nero sits and waits...snags Spock and his ship...gathers the blobby singularity goo and wreaks havoc (after stranding old Spock on Hoth 2.0)?

I feel like I'm missing something or have my facts wrong. Please advise. :)

Good show though...just got done seeing it...just trying to get the time lines correct.

No, I think you got it right. He sat there pissed off doing nothing for.... 25 years.

And to think, when I was in the Navy I started going stir-crazy if I didn't get off the ship after a couple of weeks. :spock:

LOL

Yea...so are we to believe that one of their romulan engineers did some calculation judging when each ship entered the black hole to know at what point in time/space they'd end up?

After the old mind meld the action started again and I wanted to hit rewind and see that sequence once again.

I guess that's possible - perhaps they calculated when Spock would arrive and went into suspended animation. That would certainly make much more sense. Perhaps this will be better explained when the DVD comes out.

Honestly, I was disappointed.

I thought the choice of actors was excellent. Chris Pine was amazing as Kirk. I always thought Kirk was a badass, not like he was in this film. The constant womanizing and smart-ass remarks were a highlight. The others were outstanding as well, particularly Karl Urban. He absolutely nailed McCoy, which was something I didn't think possible.

The action sequences were awesome and I loved Sulu's blade. The Kobiashi Maru bit was hilarious. Much funnier than I expected (along with the "creator" of the program).

I guess what really bummed me out was the villain. I didn't mind the idea of the Romulans, I'm just sick of time travel in all of the post-TOS episodes and movies. SICK of it. It's just so tired. I know that Abrams & Co. needed something to divert the story line from the TOS to "reboot" the franchise, I just think that they could have found a different plot device to do so.

For that fact alone, I only give it 4 out of 5 stars.

The guy that did Chekov was awesome. Looked nothing like Koenig, but the character and voice were dead on.

He was great. There wasn't one single bad casting choice made for this movie, which is rare.

From a person who saw like 2 of the originals and Star Trek Generations, I found that this was an excellent movie. This movie was how remakes should be, with the Star Wars franchise you could see the aging philosophies of Lucas but with Abrams at the helm you really saw what a new and upcoming director could do with a classic franchise.

Nero wasn't the best bad guy, his look was the only thing that made him a bad guy. He was just out for revenge but considering his motive and the fact that his planet Rhomulus wasn't destroyed until way into the future you could see him possibly trying to help save his planet instead of just making spock suffer. Other than that the drill, red matter, black hole plan was a sound way of revenge. I would've liked to have seen spock fight Nero hand to hand but alas.

I loved the cast, everyone seemed right in place with the only exception being sulu's voice just not being able to be replicated. So for me it seemed as though Cho just could'nt pull the part off and he was not much more than just an asian american fill in. The fencing combat line was really funny but other than that he just seemed meh. I thought Chris Pine nailed Kirk, and so did the guy who played spock. I'll admit I raised an eyebrow when I knew that Sean of the Dead would be playing Scottie, but I'll also admit he was really impressive as him. The worst casting decision I thought was Winona Ryder as Spock's mom, she just didn't look like she could or would be spock's mom and they could've picked a better actress for the part. Also Tyler Perry as the head of the starfleet was kind of awkward as well.

Other than that like I said excellent movie definetly an A, and I am gonna go see it in IMAX for my second time no doubt.

Just got back. I enjoyed it very much. Bravo to Abrams for taking a stale franchise and breathing new life into it.

Personally i think the characters of the original series are still the best so he did the right thing in going back to them.

Pine was perfect. Dude is a star. He looks and acts nothing like Shatner, but he did a very good job of evoking the character of Kirk.

Everyone else was nails as well. Perfect castiing.

I thought Bana was good as Nero, but as most have said already, he was probably the weak point of the movie or a lack of backstory.

I look forward to more movies with this cast and creative team.

Loved the movie, the cast was amazing..

1. Nero was not a weak villain, they just ended with a whimper.. My problem is spock on the planet.. Uhh wtf, there was a federation station on a planet by Vulcan?? Why didn't he go there, they have a ****ing relay station.. As soon as that big ****ing ship comes through they should have shot out a signal.. Only gets blocked when the ships penis was out.. Also after the ship left they could have shot a signal..

2. No problem with 2.

3. It is a good way to kick off the new Trek, everything is new now.. They distanced themselves from the old series and movies by making it a new reality.. Or the old spock is still around and knows how to travel in space again if he ever wants to try and correct things..

oh....and Michael Giacchinos score was rock solid perfect. That dude is great.

I was waiting for him to slice open some heads..

.

The singularity is how he knew when/where to come back and get spock after that.. Other then that I think he was flying around stewing in revenge..

Oh I see...so basically they monitored for the black hole...found it and intercepted it.

That makes more sense. Thanks.

I like the idea of a new Star Trek timeline, an alternate alternate reality. That means in the future Star Trek can be completely different with no Kirstie Alley. That's a win - maybe the Tuvok family got out alive.

The Uhura-Spock thing was an interesting twist.

How many of you thought during the high-dive onto the mining laser, "Y'know, the guy in red ain't gonna make it."

All in all, I had a great time. One of the more entertaining flicks I've seen in awhile. Tomorrow night some friends of mine and I are discussing either going to see Star Trek again, or going to see the Royals @ the Angels.

Oh, yeah - Karl Urban's voice inflections and timbre were better than I would've hoped for. He made a good McCoy.

Heres a really good review from someone over at aint it cool news. Pretty much adresses all the concerns most have mentioned here.


http://www.aintitcool.com/node/41016

Captain: We're going on an away mission. Ensign Cannon Fodder, would you be so kind as to join the rest of us?

Here is the first ive heard about this. Apparantly Abrams cut out scenes that mentioned what Nero had been doing.....


http://chud.com/articles/articles/19...AKE/Page1.html


"Also hurting Nero is the decision to cut a key sequence from the movie. As the film stands now, Nero appears 25 years before the film's present and kills Kirk's father. It then skips ahead 25 years where Nero comes out of nowhere in an attempt to kill Spock from the future, who is also time traveling by accident. Audiences have to wonder 'What the **** has Nero been doing for the last quarter of a century? Just sitting around?' It turns out he was captured by Klingons and held on their prison planet; test audiences didn't like the scenes about the Klingons so Abrams cut them, turning a villain who was already weak into a villain who is also lazy and stupid. It's a shockingly bad decision, and I think indicative of the problems with the test screening process"

I thought it utterly and completely sucked ass.

There was no memorable opening theme and his cues were completely forgettable.

Just got back. Great movie. Very well done. I would have loved to see it in IMAX. I'm with you on the Nero part, but I understand it was more about character development than was a bad guy.

Movie was a BAMF

That would make a lot more sense about the message from the KLINGON PRISON CAMP. :doh!:

Damn, no wonder they cut that out. Whoever thought of that lame ass idea should have been sent to the prison planet.

One issue I had was why would they have to drill into the planet to "plant" the black hole. Wouldn't dropping it on the surface essentially be just as good?

Another thing i just thought of....

Did they ever show how they took the Ceti eel out of Capt. Pike? All i remember is them dropping it in him, then KIrk rescuing him later and he was fine? Sounds like another cut scene somewhere?

this has been going on for quite awhile.....
Opinions are like a-holes...everyone has one , they all stink.

Be a director, how much "time" would it add to the film to complete the story. :shake:

Well, he was in a wheelchair at the end of the movie. Perhaps they couldn't remove it and it permanently ****ed him up.

Oh I enjoyed this VERY much. Bones was nails. Kirk, spot on!!! Young Spock perfect.

I agree that Nero was weak in the film but having the back story from the comic made that much easier for me to deal with.

My only real issue with the movie was the fact that they had Kirk and Spock basically the same age. Maybe I just misunderstand Vulcan aging concept but he should have looked older than Kirk. Minor issue though and doesn't detract from the movie at all.

When they made the space leap I laughed though. My son didn't get it until I explained to him afterwards that the guy in red always died.

I absolutely loved the humor in this and really feel for the people with no trek history to go on that missed some of the classic zingers.

Personally, I enjoyed this much more than Dark Knight.

That was my thought also. It was supposed to make him spill the beans about the code, so I didn't think it was supposed to alter his speech.
Posted via Mobile Device

Those are the same eels that were in Wrath of Khan right?

If they were, how come they didnt make Pike loyal to Nero and his every command like in Khan?


When young Kirk approached Pike, he whipped out a phaser and shot a member of Nero's crew without even blinking.

Again, I assume there will be an extended DVD that answers all our questions.

I hope it's about four hours long.

Almost all of the problems with this film could have been fixed with another 30-45 minutes of run time. Cutting the Klingon prison camp was stupid. Adding another 20-30 minutes for character development would have been great (not alone lessening the impact of all the "coincidences" for everyone to come together). All in all, my biggest issue with the movie is that it just seemed incredibly rushed.

One other thing, I really hated the fact that they turned the Enterprise into a brewery. The scene with all those giant stainless steel kettles really pulled me out of the story.

Kahn's went in the ear, Nero's went in the mouth. More like the ones from probably the worst TNG episode ever. The little play-doh alien things. Which ironically, also took over the host.

It seems Abrams was concerned with pacing above al else. He really kept the pace up throughout the entire movie.

Ironically, one of my least favorite parts was when old Spock mind melded with young Kirk. That whole scene was one loooooooong explanatory dialogue that probably could have been setup better.

the villain was weak, and easily dispatched with, but the movie was all about reintroducing characters anyways...each character has to get in their iconic lines or behaviors...

i thought the whole old spock in the arctic was basically a big narrative cheat, kind of story for reeruns...he told you how the movie would progress and end..

but so what, it's still just a blockbuster and has to adhere to the explosions and laser quotas....given those restrictions, it was a pretty good flick..the cast was better than i expected..i feared dawson's creek in space

the best part is the cgi, design, and effects....top notch, best space settings since the original star wars....

the next should better, now they can focus on the story

it's wasn't Batman, but it wasn't Transformers either....so kudos

Seems like, lately, that they are shying away from putting all the added content on DVDs anymore. I really hate that too. There is no reason to withhold it.

Aside from the generic villain, I loved it. A very nice take on an old classic, and a clever way to breathe fresh life into a stale franchise.

That, and they killed off Winona Ryder. :thumb:

Saw it earlier today. Agree with all about the characters. It's uncanny how all those actors made me believe that they really were the younger models of all the Trek characters. Outstanding casting. Kind of a waste of Bana's talents to reduce him to what Nero's level was, but that is ultra-high nitpickiness there. Great, great movie. I'll probably see it again soon.

OK, I'm going to go mega Trek geek here -

In an episode of Voyager (yes, I really am referencing Voyager here), there was a time ship that came back first to the 24th century from the 30th (31st?) century, and then continues back to the late 20th century, with Voyager in pursuit. In that episode, we learn of the Temporal Prime Directive, and the arm of the Federation that is charged with looking out for the stability of the timeline. Wouldn't the event of the Romulan mining ship going back in time and destroying Vulcan be picked up by the Temporal Patrol people? (And was I the only one that half expected the Enterprise E to show up and fight off Nero at the very end?)

Maybe it caused him that all he could say from that point on was "I'm relieved.":shrug: I personally don't think that he was necessarily fine when Kirk found him, he looked like he had the plague with his skin color, but the bug was only supposed to make him tell the truth, I dont think the bug was like that other bug from wrath of khan.

Thinking about Chris Pine's depiction of Kirk reminds me of how Harrison Ford portrayed Han Solo.

Did anyone else actually like how they finally portrayed this ship as...a Ship? Specifically the engine room. IT isn't this nice carpeted little anti-matter pod in the middle of the room all humming. It looked like an actual ship.

Also I never liked how the ships would swoop around like fighters....IE: insurrection. I got a feeling with this one that there is size and they are "ships of the line" no star fighters.

One reason why I liked Battlestar Galactica. The big ships move like BIG ships.

The best part about the time travel aspect was that it was completely inadvertent. It wasn't like Nero went back in time on purpose; they were sucked into the black hole on opposite sides, and the fact that one emerged on top of the U.S.S. Kelvin and one came out 25 years later was an accident. Meanwhile, Nero had that much time to plan his revenge/lose his mind.

For me, this is still the 3rd best Trek behind First Contact and Wrath of Khan, but it's much much better than Nemesis, Generations or Insurrection.

The only real gripe I have with the film is the score; it wasn't terrible or anything, but this is much poorer than any of Jerry Goldsmith's efforts or James Horner's.

God does it feel good to be able to talk about Star Trek in public again :D Hopefully the film does well enough for Paramount to give us a proper new series. Though that may be asking too much.

I thought it was awesome. Plot holes? Sure. Most movies have them. Great acting, great SFX, great reboot.

Not the best movie EVER, but certainly a kickass start to the summer movie season.

There are two sequels currently planned

Really? Cool. I'm pretty oblivious to the movie making process. At what point do they 100% commit to it?

The final point in this case was when the head of the studio (Brad Grey), sees audiences all over the world go absolutely nuts one month before the movie's released. (The x-US premieres).

Plus, Bad Robot has a new deal with Paramount, so unless the movie was a total abortion (which of course, it's not), Paramount was going to order a sequel.

I've been hearing since January that they were going to do at least one sequel (if not two). That made me pretty confident that the movie was going to hit. I kept reassuring people here that it was going to be good (based on my info and knowledge of the script) and I'm glad to hear that people are enjoying it.

I agree. I just saw the movie a couple of hours ago and I can't recall the music at all. And I'm a musician.

No worries. It appears its going to have a 70+ opening weekend.

Next week it will pass Star Trek 4 as the highest grossing Trek film of all time.

There was music in the movie? Hell I only remember the poor opening theme and then the ending theme that SHOULD have been at the beginning, though I understand why it wasn't.

As I mentioned earlier, the music sucked.

The opening (Star Trek) was SO less than Epic, it was a major drag.

I don't understand.

I kind of liked his opening cue. But yea, he didnt really have too much original music. He mostly took the themes from the other films and re worked them. Loved how he even reworked the original series theme at the end. That was a nice touch.

<embed width="448" height="361" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" src="http://i263.photobucket.com/player.swf?file=http://vid263.photobucket.com/albums/ii137/Alembic-/Videos/SNL-WilliamShatner-GetALife.flv">

Giggity giggity giggity.... green chicks are the shit....

http://img22.imageshack.us/img22/1852/startrek2v.jpg
Rachel Nichols (Rachel Gibson in Ailias and Scarlett O'Hara in G. I. Joe)

I liked that they got away from the sterile engine room look, but to me they just turned it into a factory. I mean I can totally understand a water reclamation/distribution system being required on a ship like that, but WTF was the giant food processor for (other than scaring Scotty)? Yes they would be using macerators, but those would be closer to the intakes to reduce pipe volume requirements.

I guess basically, it was nice to see them go "behind the scenes" on the working of the ship, but it just didn't seem to fit (and it didn't seem like an engine room).

I think you know too much about reactors.

That's excellent. But i was also hoping it may encourage Paramount to try another Star Trek TV series, and try letting someone other than Rick Berman do it. I'd kinda like to see what happens 20 years post-Nemesis.

True, I don't really know anything about space ship reactor rooms beyond what I see in scifi flicks, but I really hope they don't look like the brewery I took a tour at once, the sewage processing plant on Dirty Jobs, or the gas refinery plant I did some contract work at. It just kinda kills the ambiance of the film when something that's supposed to be so futuristic (spaceship), looks so mundane.

I really did love the movie though. If they release an extended version on BR, I'll by it in a heartbeat.

Well, the engine room certainly looks more like a real ship engine room than anything I've seen on Star Trek in the past. And I've seen a few real ship engine rooms.

That said, I didn't really care for it, either. I can't really think of a reason for a water line to (a) be transparent or (b) curve around like some sort of big log flume ride, other than to give Scotty some sort of perilous entrance.

And if he'd beamed into a space occupied by water or any other substance other than air, it seems like it should have killed him.

Perhaps these new transporters are different. :spock:

With current technology(CGI) if it's done right it, could be done a 1000 years after Next Generation.

I'd actually prefer another series set in the time of the current movie - perhaps focusing on a different ship. With the timeline irrevocably altered, they would be free to do anything they wanted. Perhaps they could have it set on the Decker-commanded Constellation.

Star Trek Boldly Resurrects Franchise
http://io9.com/5247236/star-trek-bol...ects-franchise

Box office estimates place Star Trek somewhere in the region of a $70 million domestic take for its opening weekend, roughly half of the JJ Abrams movie's estimated budget. But what does that actually mean?

To expand a little on that box office estimate, Hollywood Reporter is estimating "somewhere between $65 million to $75 million," while the always-editing Nikki Finke is currently pinning it down somewhere closer to $72 million. This is less than last weekend's X-Men Origins: Wolverine (which raked in $85.1 million), but way above the original tracking numbers for the revamped space opera, which had suggested an opening weekend of around $50 million (For math fans, Trek also played in 3,849 theaters versus Wolverine's 4,099, not that that 250 theater difference probably affected the outcome noticably).

Add to that, Abrams' reboot is the most successful opening for the director (Unsurprisingly, considering that it's only his second movie after Mission: Impossible III) and the most successful for the Trek franchise. Most importantly, perhaps, it's also the most successful franchise reboot movie of recent years, significantly besting Casino Royale and Batman Begins in terms of opening day takes. Not bad for a series that was, many thought, best left for dead after the cancellation of Star Trek: Enterprise in 2005.

(International box office estimates aren't officially in yet, but rumors are that Trek is close to Wolverine's $72 million, which would be unprecedented for the franchise, and a sign that this Trek is a bona fide hit for Paramount.)

With critical response for the movie so positive - currently at 96% on Rotten Tomatoes - this movie may end up being this year's Iron Man; a nerd movie that surprises critics and mainstream audiences alike, and ends up showing more staying power than anyone expected.

sucks that wolverine is going to make more then this opening weekend that movie is a POS.

I enjoyed it.

They can do a lot better. It was heavy on action and light on plot. I hope they learn something from past Treks. For instance, Star Trek IV, is terrific. I don't think a single shot is fired in that movie, apart from the melting of a doorlock.

I didn't mind the villain's lack of depth because I had already read his story in the preview comic, which really fleshes him out.

The mining ship, BTW, has been outfitted by the Romulans with hybrid Borg technology...so that explains why it's such a freaking badass.

That was an awesome flick. I'm planning on watching it again.

The one thing that bugged me is that there weren't any great Romulan vs. Human/Vulcan (or any other Starfleet) fights.

Reading the mini graphic novels pretty much covered Nero. Too bad they couldn't have fleshed him out more in the movie though.

The only thing that really bugged me about Nero was his very un-Romulan way of greeting people. "Hello Christopher." I mean, come on. heh

Just read through the thread. Agree w/ everyone on the score.

Walking out of the theater last night, the one thing we all agreed upon was that the music sucked, and that Nero wasn't the greatest bad guy.

For comparisions sake, the last Trek flick "Nemesis" made 43 mil its entire theatrical run.


Yes, America was ready for a fresk take on Trek.