Saw new Trek movie (Contains Spoilers)
I broke my own long-standing prohibition on movie theaters and saw the new Star Trek movie yesterday. I went in with high hopes given widespread praise the film has received, but came out disappointed.
The movie opens with a temporal parodox event that branches the movie on to an alternate timeline, which then gives the film a free hand to ignore all the Trek canon and go in a different and unexpected direction. While this is at least an attempt to pay homage to existing canon, something the asshat Rick Berman wouldn’t even bother with, it changes the movie completely.
Going in I expected to see some some additional light shed on the background of TOS crew and perhaps a twist both unexpected and consistent with existing canon. What I got instead was the groundwork for an entirely new universe of Trek, built on the somewhat shoddy foundation of a heretofore unknown time warp. Not exactly the resounding reboot of the franchise I was hoping for.
Notwithstanding these structural deficiencies, I found the dialog between the characters to be somewhat formulaic for modern action films, as though the movie isn’t taking itself too seriously. While I’ve enjoyed many films with this quality, it was overdone for this movie.
Finally, I thought the romance between Spock and Uhura strained credulity, even given the cover of an alternate timeline.
In all this is a disappointing addition to the Trek movie library. It’s not the worst Trek movie ever (Star Trek: The Motion Picture clearly holds that honor), but it is far from the best.