Star Trek

[sarahstitcher]

I have begun watching The Next Generation on dvd, borrowed from my friend with the amazing dvd collection. I haven't had a tv for so long, I haven't seen any of it before. I caught the pilot of Enterprise by going to a friend's house, but it wasn't something I could do every week. Gotta love those box sets! I'm through season 2 so far. The first few shows of season 1, you could really see the cast and writers getting their sea legs together! By halfway through they were all in sync in a really nice way, so I'm enjoying it very much.

[Erech the undead]

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This thread merits renewal, as does the franchise. Five days till the "reboot." I'm psyched, though I won't get to see it for six months...
The promo ads look great, except for the stupid, insulting tag line in the ads: Forget Everything You Know...What the heck is that supposed to mean? Throngs of Trek devotees will be praying that Abrahms stays true to the mythology, so why a dumb-azzed tagline like that??? It's not like they won't sell any tickets!!!

Still, I'm glad to see Star Trek is (hopefully) eternal, and will hopefully still exist when they actually do launch vessels to a distant star...(cue the music..!!..)...

Oh, and Zach Quinto makes a very good Spock. Chris Pine doesn't look half bad as Kirk, either. And the graphics look amazing. Now if they would just stay true to the mythology...(prays, which, if you know me, you know I rarely do...)...

[Pippin's Sunshine]

AWESOME MOVIE!!!!!!!!!! zachary Quinto as Spock and Karl Urban as Bones.... Those were scary accurate.

This movie is literally total nonstop action

[lindorie]

I have heard very little negative about this movie. We are going on Sunday. I can hardly wait!!!

[Pippin's Sunshine]

O yea, and it really is *reboot* of the franchise. Go with an open-mind. JJ Abrams tweaks with the universe a little

[Erech the undead]

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Urban! I just found out! A Rings/Trek tie-in! Awesome! I always cheer a little, when a Rings veteran lands a new job, especially Karl, who wasn't one of the acting "heavyweights," in the LotR cast, but has nonetheless carved out a successful niche for himself, in action/sci-fi fliks, most notably, now, with Trek. Marvelous! 'Cause you know the big name vets always find new projects.

I love it when the less famous folks land a role. It cheers me a bit... Even the actor who played Celeborn, Martin Csokas, has worked alot, in XXX (Vin D), Bourne Supremacy (ask me who, I'll tell ya'), Star Wars: Attack of the Clones, and many more. So yeah, I was happy to hear that Karl, or any Ringer vet, made it into Star Trek.

As a matter of fact, Csokas, a NZ native, gave us the Rings/Star Wars tie-in, and now Karl gives us the Rings/Trek connection. If only we could nail down a Rings/Potter tie-in...

Way to go Karl! And, critics say he does a very good job of echoing the McCoy character, honoring DeForrest Kelly's legacy role.

And Nimoy looks terrific, in recent interviews: healthy, vigorous, and spirited. It appears he and Quinto have become friends, which I'm glad to see. We're actually seeing more of Nimoy, now, than we did during the original cast, and Next Gen phase of the film franchise. Way to go, you fascinating old Vulcan! Gotta love it! A Seventy five year old Jew who still travels the world over, and looks just as good in character, now, as he did then. Amazing man.

Also, thankfully, for me, especially, the cast has been all over late night, and morning TV, recently. Last night alone, Nimoy, and Quinto were on Fallon, together, complete with pyrotechnics! I've recorded Nimoy twice, this week, though I missed him on the View, and Chris Pine twice; Zack Quinto two, or three times, and one other, who's name escapes me, right now. Oh, and Abrahms, too, who tried to explain to Kimmel why Shatner couldn't be Kirk, anymore, though we all know he's right there, in the Nexus, waiting for his casting call from the present..!!...

[OrangeblossomTook]

It was, indeed, an awesome renewal, reboot, thing! I saw the movie last night and it was amazing. Spock has always been my favorite of original Trek.

[lindorie]

I heard an audio clip on NPR yesterday of the part when Bones and Kirk meet, I think. It cracked me up to hear Karl grousing about how he was being transported.

[yaralindi]

I just sat through "the movie" and it was entertaining, mildly. I went in with few pre-conceptions (how could you not have some?) and with hopes of a new Star Trek franchise. I left feeling cheated out of $12. The visuals were superb. That is about the only thing going for this film.

Hopefully, this will put the final nail in the coffin of "alternate timeline" science fiction re-writes of established story lines, but I doubt it. If Abrams had respected the characters he warped or the fans he disappoints, the film would still have been poor because of the terrible science behind its main premise. I don't want to spoil anything in the story for anyone, so will defer this part of my opinion until later when more have had a chance to see the thing.

But even if the story had been established on credible science and shown with the wondrous effects that occur throughout this film, the acting would have also killed it. Zachary Quinto and Leonard Nimoy are the high spots of the film, but what they had to work with is so poor it didn't help much.

Chris Pine as Kirk is terrible. He delivers his lines like he's reading from a cue card. Eric Bana tries to be villainous as an evil Romulan, but can't make it work. Karl Urban, a very talented actor, can't help showing that he understands that Bones McCoy does not join Enterprise until 2266, several years after Kirk becomes Captain in 2263. His character is out of place in the movie and the lines, apparently written to draw some comparison to the older McCoy, are delivered with about as much zeal as Diana Muldaur did when she tried the same thing as Kate Polaski in Next Generation. Zoe Saldana as Uhura would have worked except the story casts her in a very bad light. I leave it to those who have yet to see it to discover why I say this. She gives a very lackluster performance as a result.

Which brings me to Scotty. Montgomery Scott has always been my favorite character from ToS. To me, he was the most "human" of the characters with foibles and a depth that put Kirk and McCoy to shame. James Doohan was able to pull this off without effort. Simon Pegg tried to be a duplicate of Doohan and failed in the attempt. Zachary Quinto pulls off the role of Spock so well because he made the character his own. You can see the respect he has for how Nimoy portrayed Spock, but very quickly in the movie you understand this is Quinto's Spock - and it's more than okay, it's great. Pegg tries to imitate another actor being another character and fails miserably at both.

There are attempts at humour in the story - attempts that fail. In one scene Scotty is flowing through a tube of water on the Enterprise. How he got there is plausible. Why the plumbing would not have shut down at the abrupt change of water pressure is beyond me. This happens aboard Navy ships now. An odd blockage causes the system to shut down and warning lights to go off on a number of panels. Why would such failsafes not be in place aboard a futuristic star ship? The reason? It was supposed to be funny. It has no bearing on the plot, does not advance the story, and would have been improbable under the best of circumstances. It should have been left out.

My advice to the writers of Star Trek. NO MORE TIME TRAVEL SCRIPTS!

My advice to you. See the film. Make the call yourself. Is this Star Trek as Gene would have portrayed it (and yes I understand the franchise can move past Gene's quaint 1960's utopian ideals - so did Gene) or is it Star Wars Meets Rambo, The Motion Picture.

The visual effects are good. Quinto and Nimoy are wonderful even with the poor material they were given. Aside from that, its a B movie with pretentions of being something better.

On a scale of 1 to 5, 5 being best. I'd give it a solid 3.

[lindorie]

so far, this is the only negative thing I've heard about the movie from any of my friends that have gone to see it. I'm still looking forward to it and planning on having a heck of a ride!

[Erech the undead]

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Well, I can only hope you were a bit hard on the work, though I've secretly had my fingers crossed, myself. I've been dreading any wholesale breaks from the franchise mythology, and would hope that fan pressure will influence Abrahms, as they go forward. I simply have to hope that the subtleties, and subjective nature of perception have colored your views, to the point where the film seemed as subpar as you say.

For the franchise' sake, the fan's sake, and, selfishly, my own hopes for the films, I have to hope that you are either wrong, or overly critical of the work. I don't question your perceptiveness, at all. I simply won't be able to avoid being fairly well crushed, if the thing really is subpar.

I can rationalise it all, to an extent, by noting that the last three films with the Next Gen cast were mediocre, but as a die hard fan, I found enough good in the stories, and characters, to keep my interest through repeat viewings at home. I'm guessing that whatever faults this film has, they will not be enough to prevent my repeat interest in it, when I finally first see it, on DVD, or pay per view... six long months from now. Given that time span, I'll surely have heard all the spoilers by then, so don't let me stop you from discussing that flawed science you mentioned...

Generally, for what it's worth, the critics seem to be uniformly positive about it, though this raises questions about their ages, knowledge of the franchise, tolerance for mainstream sci-fi, etc... We'll see...

On a related note, Majel Barrett has released details of the will, with their son receiving 60 million now, and 10 million at 5 year intervals, while the house keeper/caregiver, will get a million for maintainance of the family pets, and can live in the mansion as she tends to them. Lucky dog, as they say...

[Gandalf the white]

I just got back from it, and I really loved this movie.

Though I've never seen the TV show, the movie was just awesome.

Some of the best visual effects ever!
Great action, I thought the acting was really good... I loved the cinematography, and the story was good.

As an avid Stargate fan, I'm used to all the "Timeline changing" plots.

[Lithilien Quicksilver]

Oh, haven't the energy to read thru all of this now, but Sala posted on facebook that he is in the new ST - unfortunately, he dies rather early on, I gather. I haven't been able to see it yet. But I'm sure we can take the Dark Lord's word for it.

[Pippin's Sunshine]

really Lith? That's cool

[lindorie]

I didn't see him, but did see his name in the credits at the end. All I can say is......WOW!!!!!!!!!!!

Brilliant, just brilliant and the future is endless! I want more! I will be seeing it again, one of these days, but not for a couple of weeks or so as we have so much stuff going on for a while. The casting was great! I hardly recognized Karl sometimes, but he captured Bones well. Beam me up, Scotty! I'm ready to go off planet...now! \ \\//