Star Trek, reader review

Guest critic RRA emerges from his popcorn movie worm hole to offer us his Star Trek reader review,

STAR TREK (2009) – ***1/2 (out of 5)

I won’t give you the usual speech given for the last few decades about STAR TREK’s pop culture impact, it’s rather dedicated global cultdom (especially those Germans), inspiring generations of scientists and inventors, inspiring the modern nerd stereotype by logically matching self-made costumes and geek conventions, and blah blah. Look, I expect you all to know that already.

The only thing I’ll elaborate on though is that I did grow up with STAR TREK. Though no Trekkie, I still care much about TREK. At it’s best, STAR TREK can be great episodic science fiction/adventure/western/comic book pulp fun, which also featured intelligent, even at times rather emotional, classic genre writing, whatever it be on television (“The City on the Edge of Forever”) or at the movies (WRATH OF KAHN).

STAR TREK is like any other genre franchise, for it has its good and bad days, but TREK fans will agree with me that we’ve been in the pits for way way too long. Consider that the last few TREK movies in INSURRECTION and NEMESIS both sucked hard one right after another. Never mind that abomination THE FINAL FRONTIER from several years earlier. Then simultaneously, we also had to suffer through the lame and utterly uninspired TV spin-offs VOYAGER and ENTERPRISE, both which clogged up the airways with mediocrity. Hell the ineptitude of NEMESIS so angered and pissed me off, I didn’t watch anything TREK for years, not even KAHN.

We were long gone from the golden days of when we could safely depend upon a dwey entertaining TREK picture, or enjoy the tremendously popular syndication sensation THE NEXT GENERATION, or shit even watch an underappreciated, mature and captivating television novel like DEEP SPACE NINE (the BATTLESTAR GALACTICA of its day.) TREK for too long rested on it’s trophy mantle, it’s creative geist tapped out, and desperately needed a good inspirational kick in the ass. TREK was as dead as fried chicken.

I believe that might be why the geeks are embracing J.J. Abrams’ STAR TREK. I mean if you’re starved for weeks, a saltine cracker becomes the greatest meal ever, and 7 years is a very long time. The Nerd Internet Clique is already overhyping this new TREK, particularly by a certain one who in hyperbole galore described it as “RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, but in space!” (Dude, Isn’t that STAR WARS?) Off-topic guys, but here is some free advice: Quit whining so openly in your reviews about not getting your DVD screener or advance tickets from the studios. Besides nobody caring, at least give me a reason to take your opinions seriously. Follow The Outlaw Vern’s example. Anyway, I’m sorry if I sound like I’m putting down STAR TREK, for I actually quite enjoyed it.

The movie’s tagline of “This isn’t your Dad’s STAR TREK” is sorta a misnomer, for much like the old school TREK show we still have the doomed red shirts, more science fiction than science fiction, familiar catchphrases (“Dammit Jim, I’m a Doctor, not a-“), kitsch campy art deco, all phasers set to stun, incompetent security personnel, cheesy theme song, some dorky comedy, James Tiberius Kirk the whoremonger, Scotty the engineer miracle worker, Spock the exotic brainiac show-stealer, the token racial/nationality cast, the U.S.S. Enterprise always the only starship in vicinity to save the day, the expositional captain’s logs, simplistic metaphors used to explain complex technobabble, and so forth.

The major difference with this new STAR TREK is the approach, appealing more to mainstream audiences virgin to TREK while giving nudges here and there that dedicated fans will recognize and eat up, much akin to the recently successful (on both sides of the Atlantic) DOCTOR WHO relaunch. I do get a chuckle out of Abrams’ big budget TREK emulating with CGI the original series and its shoestring budget and FX consisting of cardboard, clay, and plastic. For you fresh maidens, you don’t need to necessarily see the previous movies or episodes, but hey check some of them out if you do enjoy Abrams’ STAR TREK. Put some goddamn money into the pockets of Nicholas Meyer, Norman Spinrad, D.C. Fontana, and Harlan Ellison.

Otherwise, STAR TREK in heart delivers what a decent TREK yarn should dish out: Taunt thrills and legitimate tension, decent villainy acted with believable motivation, lively and colorful interactive cast, gratifying spaceship battle scenes, real stakes, you actually give a crap about these people, etc. Yet two things still bug me.

First, after that whole STAR WARS prologue (reveal big ship, then even bigger ship), when daddy Kirk sacrifices himself to rescue his crew while his son is born. What bullshit. Much like the useless domestic subplot in 300, this movie didn’t need that junk. If you take that element out, nobody (especially the narrative) would have missed it. Worse, I think it makes the father less of a hero, or as I call it, the DIE HARD 2 Scenario. Sure he saves many people, but that includes his family. That’s not being a hero, that’s being responsible. A considerable difference in my book. Too bad STAR TREK had to join those SPIDER-MAN films where a hero just can’t be a hero not because it’s the right choice of morality, but because it got personal when the villain holds his woman hostage. Fuck you Spider-Man, and fuck you George Kirk.

Second, if not perfect I at least bought the basic storytelling logic of how the iconic Enterprise crew got together and molded much earlier than in the original continuity because of the time travel complications or whatever. Baddie sought to prevent this, and yet he actually ends up ultimately the case for it. I like that touch. Except with how young first officer Kirk (Chris Pine) tricks young captain Spock (Zachary Quinto) into getting pissed off so he could take the chair. Alright I guess Kirk needed a way to get the ship and head off Nero (Eric Bana) before he implodes Earth, but why does this still feel like a lazy creative copout to ensure that status quo? Better yet, why does Spock decide ultimately that he aint captain material? Sure he loses his temper after Kirk mocks the guy for his dead mother and other things, but I thought he kept his shit in check rather well, considering the horrific trauma he had to endure that day.

Besides, emotional discipline and leadership are not mutually exclusive. Jesus, right now in the White House resides a guy with Spock-like temperament, and cool as a cucumber. (Probably why he’s a STAR TREK fan.) Why can’t Spock do the same? Let that Kirk asshole earn his command, instead of from some weak cheat out of a writer’s block. Don’t just do what Spoiled Cameo tells you because he’s used to being the sidekick, ok? Think for yourself Vulcan. Don’t be anyone’s pointy eared bitch, you’re better than that.

There are other petty stuff I could nitpick, but I won’t dwell (too much). If a Romulan ship is stuck in a black hole for 25 years, what did they do for food and supplies? I doubt they occasionally popped out for a snack at Krystals. That’s one well-stocked vessel. What use does Scotty’s midget alien sidekick function besides cheap laughs? Why is Kirk the only one who receives the medal? He didn’t blow up the space elevator device. How did Nokia survive the future? Couldn‚Äôt Abrams have Kirk’s “cheat” to defeat the Kobayashi Maru actually be clever instead of just plain cheating? Why couldn’t the Enterprise or Spoiled Cameo use the black hole to go back/forward into time and fix up the disrupted space-time continuum? Isn’t the original reality still intact somewhere? Wouldn’t Uhura have remembered a spectacular noteworthy massacre that happened only a day earlier that she intercepted that occurred in that same region of space they’re heading towards?

Wait, I did nitpick. Fuck. Sorry.

Point is, the fact that STAR TREK goes into warp speed in spite of all those questions and plot holes is why it sure beats the hell out of NEMESIS, which surprises me considering Abrams. Remember his SUPERMAN: FLYBY script that nearly went into production under RUSH HOUR director Brett Ratner? You know, that one with kung fu Superman, Krypton doesn’t explode (ironic considering the fate of a fictional planet in his TREK), Lex Luthor is an alien, and other retarded nonsense? And some of you thought SUPERMAN RETURNS was silly.

Yeah let’s just say that when “J.J. Abrams” and “Reboot” are put into the same sentence as STAR TREK, I have good reason to be skeptical.

Also, this will horrify some folks, but I think LOST is boring. Sue me. Never watched (or intrigued enough by) ALIAS, and thought his MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE movie was OK if forgettable (and wasted a great Philip Seymour Hoffman performance). I did like CLOVERFIELD, but he only produced it, so I guess that doesn’t count. Plus the TREK trailer gave off this puny emo/metrosexual/TOP GUN vibe that…turned me off. So I’m glad that Abrams actually had it in him to pull off a good TREK movie, but mate don’t let it go to your head. Just remember that only a decade ago, you were a scriptwriter on Michael Bay’s ARMAGEDDON. Be humble.

I must make mention of how STAR TREK has a really good cast who don’t betray those characters, and each have a nice scene. I mean Sulu (John Cho) never got one in the older movies, even when he was supposedly commanding his own starship. I appreciate that. I bought Pine immediately as a swaggering, charismatic asshole who slings more dick around than Don Rickles does insults. Uhura (Zoe Saldana) is now more than the glorified secretary. Simon Pegg is a joy, and hey if Enterprise is ever invaded by zombies or Timothy Dalton in a sequel, they know who to call. They cast a real Russian for Chekov. Bruce Greenwood (a favorite of mine since THIRTEEN DAYS) even gets a small badass moment while strapped to a table. I never saw Bruce Willis do that. Winona Ryder is just…random. Her wardrobe though kinda looks pretty.

What I don’t comprehend is some reviewers who are acting as if they finally noticed Karl Urban or something. Sure his LORD OF THE RINGS role wasn’t exactly deep, but he did his job. Yet same reviewers never mention his strong work as the assassin in THE BOURNE SUPREMACY, or that he was even solid in that piece of shit PATHFINDER. Not trying to be a dick here (too late), just pointing out that he was slick dick elsewhere in between RINGS and TREK.

I do join though with other reviewers in praising Quinto. Let’s admit it, Spock has always been the coolest sucker in TREK, and most fun and interesting to play I assume. Quinto hits a homerun with how his character was remodulated as a blood traitor on Vulcan, and as a weird if alienating (pun!) creature to the humans. Bullied and misunderstood for much of his life, he must have used his superior intelligence to develop and mature that trademark sarcastic deadpan wit. He even aces the eyebrow! He’s got a future. Again, why isn’t he the captain?

So yeah, I liked STAR TREK. The audience at my screening applauded after the final credits rolled, and they obviously loved it much more than I did, but that’s alright. With the time travel plot device, Abrams now doesn’t have to worry about fitting neat and clean into continuity (that helped sink WOLVERINE) and do whatever he wants to now. Though early rumors already are circulating that for a sequel, he wants to remake episodes like “The City on the Edge of Forever” and “Space Seed,” but doesn’t that kinda defeat the whole purpose of his retcon if he only wants to cover the same territory again? Oh wait, Kahn. Right, sorry. What was I thinking? On second though, they should also go visit those goofy theme planets. You know, Nazi planet, Roman Empire planet, and Gangster Planet, aka Somalia.

I apologize for this lengthy rant. In short, STAR TREK isn’t WRATH OF KAHN, but not THE FINAL FRONTIER. It’s more FIRST CONTACT, a solid popcorn entry if you can trek beyond its flaws. In short short, it’s more a good blowjob, even if you wished you could have screwed her green brains out. Maybe next time.