11 Things About Star Trek That Make You Go WTF?

[Carpe Occasio]

11. Kirk's clown hands. Did we really need that?

10. Letting Willy Wonka design the engine room.

9. That whole plot point about how using the planetary drill thing (suspended improbably by what looks like a mega-huge strand of barbed wire) conveniently disrupts transporter beams and communication.

8. Mining ships of the future have enough weaponry to destroy a Starfleet armada. What exactly are they mining? (Yes, we know there is an explanation for this in the prequel comic, but if you need to read the comic to explain the movie, that's a problem. Would explaining it to the movie audience have been that difficult?)

7. Uhura casually tells her roommate that she translated a mysterious message detailing the destruction of a Klingon fleet by a large, Romulan ship, but fails to inform her captain until he's about to fly into a trap.

6. If he's getting so much action, why can't one of Spock's emotions be, you know, kinda happy? Why so dour, my Vulcan friend?

5. Rowdy officers must be jettisoned off the ship in life pods and left on ice planets. Apparently the brig was broken?

4. It's OK, though, because if you do that, the person in the life pod will manage to land right next to THE ONLY OTHER PERSON ON THE PLANET who has also been stranded there.

3. The bridge is the best place to bring suspected saboteurs. OK, this is actually a time-honored Trek tradition. But still.

2. If you accidentally get sent back 25 more than 150 years in time, it's better to take revenge on the person who was unable to save your planet than to actually, you know, TRY TO SAVE YOUR PLANET!

1. The random Star Wars and Cloverfield-like monsters appearing for no particular reason.


http://scifiwire.com/2009/05/11-things-about-star-trek.php

 

[Trekker4747]

5. Rowdy officers must be jettisoned off the ship in life pods and left on ice planets. Apparently the brig was broken?

Kirk was proving himself to be more trouble than he was worth. Spock probably figured Kirk would still be a handful in the Brig if not even still manage to get out. So he jettisoned him on the ice planet.

Where the OnStar system of the pod told Kirk to remain inside and someone will come pick him up.

 

[Kaziarl]

11. Kirk's clown hands. Did we really need that?

10. Letting Willy Wonka design the engine room.

Well, since the oompa loompa was in it, sure why not?

9. That whole plot point about how using the planetary drill thing (suspended improbably by what looks like a mega-huge strand of barbed wire) conveniently disrupts transporter beams and communication.

Yeah, that thing didn't seem like it would be very precise either.

8. Mining ships of the future have enough weaponry to destroy a Starfleet armada. What exactly are they mining? (Yes, we know there is an explanation for this in the prequel comic, but if you need to read the comic to explain the movie, that's a problem. Would explaining it to the movie audience have been that difficult?)

How? General audience doesn't know what a borg is. How did Lilly put it in FC? Are they from Sweden?

7. Uhura casually tells her roommate that she translated a mysterious message detailing the destruction of a Klingon fleet by a large, Romulan ship, but fails to inform her captain until he's about to fly into a trap.

Probably didn't make the connection. She only had a peice of it, the klingon fleet. Pike knew about the lightning storm in space, but it was Kirk that put the two together. I do think she should have brought it to the attention to someone at the academy though.

6. If he's getting so much action, why can't one of Spock's emotions be, you know, kinda happy? Why so dour, my Vulcan friend?

I dunno, aren't Vulcans usually like that?

5. Rowdy officers must be jettisoned off the ship in life pods and left on ice planets. Apparently the brig was broken?

Meh, plot device. Suspend disbelief.

4. It's OK, though, because if you do that, the person in the life pod will manage to land right next to THE ONLY OTHER PERSON ON THE PLANET who has also been stranded there.

Yup, just like they will just HAPPEN to find two perfectly good whales, in a tank, that no body will miss cause they are about to get released anyway.

3. The bridge is the best place to bring suspected saboteurs. OK, this is actually a time-honored Trek tradition. But still.

No comment on that one. But like you said, the brig was broken.

2. If you accidentally get sent back 25 more than 150 years in time, it's better to take revenge on the person who was unable to save your planet than to actually, you know, TRY TO SAVE YOUR PLANET!

Ok, this one gets a lot of shit from people. I kinda think it's reasonable for someone to go crazy after loosing their planet. I'm pretty sure he wasn't thinking clearly.

1. The random Star Wars and Cloverfield-like monsters appearing for no particular reason.


http://scifiwire.com/2009/05/11-things-about-star-trek.php

I didn't see one that looked like a star wars monster, and I haven't seen clover feild.
I think the white one reminded me of the hounds on rura penthe. Just a bit bigger.

 

[MikeS]

"Punch it" rather than "Engage"

Silly.

 

[Trekwatcher]

Let's face it: there was a lot of juvenile stuff in this movie.

 

[NCC-1701-B]

Meh, it made a good movie, why does everyone seem to scrutinize every possible detail of a film? what film have you seen where everything is completely rational? Come on...

 

[ghdavid]

I assume Kirk's hands swelled up because we learn that he has abnormally strong finger muscles. We know this because we saw him hanging by his fingertips a) as a boy at the Iowan quarry, b) on the deck of the space drill and c) on the platform of the mining ship. (The Romulans must have liked Star Wars -- another universe without railings.) The only thing missing was Kirk kicking someone else hanging by his fingers off the cliff and saying, "I have had enough of you!".

 

[Carpe Occasio]

12. A boat throttle for speed control. Just as bad as the manual manuvering joystick in Enterprise.

 

[Trekker4747]

I assume Kirk's hands swelled up because we learn that he has abnormally strong finger muscles. We know this because we saw him hanging by his fingertips a) as a boy at the Iowan quarry, b) on the deck of the space drill and c) on the platform of the mining ship...

And, well, there's the other thing that gives him stong hands.

 

[Dar70]

Meh, it made a good movie, why does everyone seem to scrutinize every possible detail of a film? what film have you seen where everything is completely rational? Come on...

Why not?? ENTERPRISE was scrutinized by many fans, even some of the same people who are now defending this film. People hated on that show for stupid reasons like the theme song and Ferengi. But I will tell you this ENTERPRISE felt to me anyways, more like Trek than this movie ever will.

 

[Franklin]

11. Kirk's clown hands. Did we really need that?

10. Letting Willy Wonka design the engine room.

9. That whole plot point about how using the planetary drill thing (suspended improbably by what looks like a mega-huge strand of barbed wire) conveniently disrupts transporter beams and communication.

8. Mining ships of the future have enough weaponry to destroy a Starfleet armada. What exactly are they mining? (Yes, we know there is an explanation for this in the prequel comic, but if you need to read the comic to explain the movie, that's a problem. Would explaining it to the movie audience have been that difficult?)

7. Uhura casually tells her roommate that she translated a mysterious message detailing the destruction of a Klingon fleet by a large, Romulan ship, but fails to inform her captain until he's about to fly into a trap.

6. If he's getting so much action, why can't one of Spock's emotions be, you know, kinda happy? Why so dour, my Vulcan friend?

5. Rowdy officers must be jettisoned off the ship in life pods and left on ice planets. Apparently the brig was broken?

4. It's OK, though, because if you do that, the person in the life pod will manage to land right next to THE ONLY OTHER PERSON ON THE PLANET who has also been stranded there.

3. The bridge is the best place to bring suspected saboteurs. OK, this is actually a time-honored Trek tradition. But still.

2. If you accidentally get sent back 25 more than 150 years in time, it's better to take revenge on the person who was unable to save your planet than to actually, you know, TRY TO SAVE YOUR PLANET!

1. The random Star Wars and Cloverfield-like monsters appearing for no particular reason.


http://scifiwire.com/2009/05/11-things-about-star-trek.php

Almost any movie can be nit-picked to death, of course. That said, are their TOO MANY liberties being taken with story telling?

11. Better done than I thought it would be. And my wife (not a Trek fan at all) laughed long and hard.

10. Agreed in full, here. The look was odd. Still, it didn't detract too much from the movie, because so much else was good. Still, the tube of water was purely a contrivance for making a comic scene with Pegg.

9. Meh. Another "Trek tradition." How many times was the transporter out of service or communications disrupted at a critical moment? Many.

8. True. But if you armed a merchant marine ship today and sent it back to 1909, it would probably be formidable. And, the Romulans might have armed their civilian ships more heavily (warrior-culture, and all).

7. Yes. Unless that kind of skirmish between Klingons and whoever was happening a lot, and this one was just particularly fierce.

6. The Spock-Uhura relationship is, in a word, awkward. Older fans will remember how many people chafed at the Scotty-Uhura relationship in TFF.

5. Spock could get a pass here for the state of mind he was in. And, Kirk didn't do much to endear himself to the rest of the crew, so maybe that's why the order was carried out.

4. Well, then one shouldn't like Casablanca. "Of all the gin joints in all the towns, in all the world, she walks into mine." Coincidences happen. The better question would be why they didn't better equip Kirk to survive on the planet, and put him 14 KM from the base.

3. Yep.

2. Nero was a disappointing villain if only because five more minutes or so on his backstory would've made it more believable. Biding his time in the 23rd century for 25 years is the hardest thing to swallow. He could've did a lot during that time. Maybe a scene with him having spent time in a Klingon prison would've been useful.

1. The monsters were stupid. Period.

 

[CommanderRaytas]

"Punch it" rather than "Engage"

Silly.

That actually bothered you? Talk about nitpicking.

The "why didn't Nero save Romulus in those 25 years" bit is just as silly a criticism. Maybe he did. You don't know that.

Nobody cares why his ship was so powerful. It doesn't matter to the general audiences; it didn't matter to me. It's not a reason to dislike a film.

So what if the pod landed near the outpost? Maybe it was programmed to to that, how would we know? That's no reason to be upset. And maybe there was destiny at play. Ka. Ka is a wheel, ask Stephen King.

Most of the things that annoyed you can be explained away with a little imagination. That's the cool thing about this film: it leaves you room to speculate and doesn't murder excitement by overload of information, like other Treks have done in the past.

No big deal.

 

[spocksbrain]

You forgot to add that Winona Ryder is about the same age as Zachary Quinto. They couldn't have used her for child-Spock scenes and gotten a woman in her 50's or 60's to play adult-Mom?

 

[Trekker4747]

You forgot to add that Winona Ryder is about the same age as Zachary Quinto. They couldn't have used her for child-Spock scenes and gotten a woman in her 50's or 60's to play adult-Mom?

It looked like they used some "old age" makeup on her for her scene with Spock.

The lovely Ms Ryder isn't that rough looking.

Where was the scene of her laying out on a dais in the arms of Sarek with her much younger looking, lovelier, self?

 

[Zulu Romeo]

"Punch it" rather than "Engage"

Silly.

At least he didn't then call Sulu "Chewie". (Mind you, if he did, it could have been a pretty clever LOST reference...)

Rowdy officers must be jettisoned off the ship in life pods and left on ice planets. Apparently the brig was broken?

Spock clearly has a sense of humour.

 

[Butters]

11. Kirk's clown hands. Did we really need that?

It was unexpected and funny. So was the numb tongue. I laughed along with most of audience with whom I watched it.

The low clearance gag was funny too. Not raucously, but funny nonetheless.

 

[ghdavid]

What about seeing one planet clearly plainly from the surface of another? If they had said "Vulcan moon with atmosphere and ice", I maybe could have bought it. But another planet that can see Vulcan? And hadn't the Enterprise already travelled some distance before it jettisoned Kirk?

 

[Jackson_Roykirk]

"Punch it" rather than "Engage"

Silly.

Well, I -- like most adults -- have probably said "Punch It" more often in my life than I have said "Engage"...However, I agree that "punch it" was a little out of place. That's not a term a Captain should use all the time; perhaps only in certain situations -- although to be fair, he didn't use it all the time.

"Engage" isn't much better, though. Perhaps "Now" or "Start" or "Go" would be better. I always found Picard's use of the word "engage" to be odd usage, and I cringed a little whenever he would say it. I think it only sounded "OK" because he used a Shakespearean voice.

 

[CommanderRaytas]

Pedal to the metal.

 

[MikeS]

"Punch it" rather than "Engage"

Silly.

That actually bothered you? Talk about nitpicking.

It did not bother me in the slightest. I enjoyed the film, and would not lose any sleep over any of the "canon violations" or anything else.

We were asked what made you go WTF...

...That line made me go WTF?!