Would Into Darkness have been a better film if Khan was not the villain?

...it worked for the Red Skull in the first Captain America film...

 

I think so. Harrison should have been an augment from Enterprise.

 

But then you would have had a section of fandom screaming 'missed opportunity' for not using on of Treks most famous bad guys in the sequel that was supposed to propel the movie franchise into $500m+ orbit. To be honest, I would have been one of them too. It's the portrayal of the character I take issue with.

The people who make these movies can't win really.

 

No, they really can't. And it's unfortunately because it ties their hands for making a movie and tell a story they want to.

 

Thing is, and JJ has a problem doing this.. with Star Trek and Star Wars.. is that.. they never had a plan for more movies.. He writes 1 and then, oh hey.. a 2nd one.. what are we doing? 3rd one? oh crap..
He should have had a plan for atleast 3 movies, it generally mapped out some outlines done to where they can be coheasive..

So in St09 should have shown the Bottany Bay in a mid or after credit scene, and a shadow fall over it.. To Be Continued!
In movie #2 have the basic front end of the movie that was shown, having Mr. Cucumber, even the Admiral Marcus. still blow up Section 31 London, still assault the admiral meeting, but instead of him beaming to Quiznos, he beams to a ship.
Have Kirk still go to the admiral, head an investigation, admiral okays it since he thinks Kirk is a wet behind the ear boob.. and won't find anything. they pop around, get clues, encounter Carol Marcus who was recently pushed out of her "Project Genisis" and that she knows Kirk from a recent Fling, and that she knows he's looking into the Mysterios attack, They take the enterprise to her lab and find that the scientist are all dead, and the Devices have been stollen. But theres a clue from some blood, and McCoy finds out that its Augment Dna, Carol knows of a possible lead in her Father's current posting, on a secret station around Io, and go there, find a base with a ship 90% finished, they look on the station, and find Khan and his crew in there meat lockers, wake up Khan and he tells Kirk and Co. that Marcus found him and his crew, and decided to dable in Genetic Engineering using them as a template, with Khan helping, he is then tossed back in the fridge when they were done with him, and Mr Cucumber is a new Augment. Khan feels betraied and asks Kirks for help. they wake the rest of the crew up, but the New Augments arrive with Mr Cucumber in a ship and find them, and the enterprise, Ship battle outside with Sulu in command, and a hand to hand battle between old and new augments,Cucumber Vs Khan, Bit of backstory by Mr Cucumber on how he was a regular starfleet officer, recuited in to Section 31, and volunteered for the augment gene therapy to battle the Klingons, Talks between him and Kirk on how he's protecting Earth. and how Admiral Marcus is going to destoy the Klingons and bring peace, Mr cucumber escapes back to the augment ship after Khan kills his boarding party, Kirk and Co. go to the ship at the base, the USS reliant, and steal it, Helps the Enterprise drive away the Augment vessel, and then Khan blows up the base.
Kirk rendevous with the Enterprise, leaving Spock and Checkov on the reliant, and Kirk explanes that that ship and the admiral are going to Klingon space to start a war.
Both ships head out with Khan agreeing to fight along with Kirk, Kirk informs Command but standard ( No ships in the quadrant) so there it..

Skip to Klingon space, showing Gorkan or Commander Krugde on the bridge of a klingon ship part of a fleet, then boom, 5 ships warp out and a battle incurrs.. Skip to the Enterprise, McGivers shows up and tells kirk of known history of Khan, in the meeting Khan informs him of himself and his crew's history, that they were on the botany bay to find a new home, and that they would like to do that when this is done, Kirk agrees with there help.

Kirk and Co warp out and find a kligon fleet destoryed and the planet on fire, about to implode. Carol explains that the Genisis device was a plan to solve food problems etc. but they weren't past the destructive phase in the devices matrix, there is no rebuilding, its a pure planet destroyeing weapon. and Admiral Marcus has 3 more devices. They find Life on the Klingon ships, beam over Gorkon, explain that this is not the federations doing, but 1 admiral and the augments, Gorkon being around for the Augment Crisis 100 years ago, remembers it, That he knew war was comming between them and the federation, and that he understands. He tells them the fleet was heading deeper in to Klingon space.

Bridge of the Vengence, Admiral Marcus and Mr Cucumber talk about what to do next, do they go to Quonos? another Colony? Marcus wants to head to quonos and make them surrender, while Cucumber wants to outright genocide the klingons, Marcus wins out, but Cucumber starts showing increased aggresion, meglomania etc. they head to Quonos

Enterprise and Reliant go to quonos, and intercept the section 31 fleet, and talk to Marcus, giving his ITD speach, but Cucumber has enough and kills marcus, and takes command of the fleet, and heads to destroy quonos, Klingon ships show up, big battle, Enterprise vs Vengence, Vengence gets away, heads to quonos, enterprise intercepts, big battle, Enterprise gets cut to pieces, Cucumber about to do the killing blow, but before, he launches a genisis device at quonos, big longwinded speach,and Khan and the reliant shows up, and takes out the devices, then swoops around and helps the enterprise take out the vengence.

Alls happy with the world, klingons are grateful, half there fleet is destroyed, so no war, Khan beams spock and checkov back and then warps away with the reliant, enterprise unable to pursue, Kirk talks about finding him agian.. Fade to black,
Mid scene, Reliant aprroaches Ceti alpha 5..

 

Because, in Hollywood, there are no guarantees.

Also, is it possible to actually use Benedict Cumberbatch's name correctly?

 

@fireproof78 Many movies are made as a first part of a trilogy that don't make enough to get a sequal, but this is Star Trek.. Unless it totally bombs, there will be a sequal.. Even Star trek 2, 3,4 make a "trilogy" abet a loose one.

Sorry for double post! hit reply instad of edit!

 

In Hollywood nothing is a sure thing, so I don't blame them for not planning out.

 

I am watching Into Darkness right now. Benedict Cumbersnatch really is great in this movie. I may not wholly agree with the way he's portrayed but boy does he still chew the scenery in this. It may not be like montalban but his turn is easily the best villain in the kelvin films.

I still really love this movie. It is like a roller-coaster ride. There is not an ounce of slack in it. It is still the consummate blockbuster in my view, despite it's many flaws.

 

It wouldn't have changed anything of substance, other than the guy's name.

Would TMP have been a better movie if V'Ger was called N'sa?

 

For me, yes.

 

Would Voyager have been a better show if Tom Paris was Nick Locarno?

 

Agreed. Especially after the Vengeance crash, the feeling of a situation having spiralled completely out of control is spot-on. Kirk is dead, Spock's left what's left of the ship to hunt down Khan for revenge. A good chunk of San Francisco has been razed. It's pandemonium. I love it.

 

Yup.

The setup of this Harrison terrorist guy only as a ruse to hide his "real" identity as Khan was a big left turn was actually quite the downer. Harrison's subplot was already compelling enough. The reimagining of Khan's origins, in a way, were better... but the movie didn't need such pandering to established fans, who'd loathe the hijacking of Khan for any number of reasons already - the least of which being Cumberbatch's impressively wooden performance for such a generic character after his "reveal".

 

Inversely so, depending on licensing costs for the name.

 

For me, yes.

 

I think that would have been a huge minority. There were TONS of trekkies that were pissed Khan was in this movie.... and the new movie goers who didn't know who Khan was were "who the hell is Khan?" when Cumby made the big reveal.

Totally agree. While I didn't want Khan in this movie, one can not really fault Cumby's performance. I accepted Khan's part in this thing. The biggest issue I had with this movie was the rip-off reversal when Kirk had to lock himself in the engine room (Pines performance was great here, but ....) and Spock yelling Khan... eesh. ...then Incredi-Spock going all Marvel at the end to catch Khan. Real Spock would have used his brain. Totally out of character.

 

I don't think it would have made a big difference. My issue with the film is much more that Marcus was too much of a mustache-twirler and the relationship between him and Khan and the plotting of both felt too contrived.

I think the point of a reboot was to be able to not be constrained by, even overly influenced by, the previous stories rather than getting to be very influenced by them, redoing them, that a reboot allowed you to go in a whole lot of new directions.

I think there is irony in that a typical complaint of the Berman films was they're all always trying to have a new Khan, that hurt the films and spoke to how Berman was a hack and ruining the franchise, and then the so very different films (that saved the franchise) again have a Khan-like villain in the first and Khan in the second.