It didn't, they did it because it was fun. Remember fun? Ringing any bells?
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I’ll just go ahead and say it: I don’t like Star Trek.
- Thread starter Gepard
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It didn't, they did it because it was fun. Remember fun? Ringing any bells?
You forget THIS IS STAR TREK. It is not allowed to be fun. It has to be morality tales all day every day....
Wait... The Trouble with Tribbles. Shore Leave. Mudds Planet. A piece of the Action....
I looked up this "fun" you mentioned in the dictionary and cross-referenced my findings with several publications of merit, and I believe I now understand this fun's general effect.
Sorry, but I don't find any of those things fun because, for me, fun stems from character. For example, last week I watched an episode of The Sopranos where Christopher was in hospital and had a vision of hell (an Irish bar) where he was given a message to relay to Tony and Paulie. Paulie's reaction to this throughout the rest of the episode was fun; he tries to justify it by claiming that the vision was really of purgatory, and eventually he goes to see a psychic who claims to see the spirits of Paulie's victims following him everywhere. That was incredibly fun.
A man running away from a green-screen just isn't fun for me. The hand thing was almost fun, but not quite.
Strawman alert!Qonos said:
Strawman alert!
Strawman alert!
You know what the first thing I thought of when I saw Scotty was in the pipe? Spock in the whale tank in TVH - down to the expression on Kirk's face when he realised where Scott was.
Kirk hitting his head on the shuttle? Scotty in STVI (i think) when he hits his head after his comment about how well he knew the ship.
Kirk hitting his head on the shuttle? Scotty in STVI (i think) when he hits his head after his comment about how well he knew the ship.
Or a healthy dose of sarcasm. Maybe I do not think the movie was just fun? Sorry Ben the world does not revolve solely around you.
Wait, that's it! Tribbles + Finnegan + Harry Mudd = the next Trek movie!
Okay. TWOK had 1 plot hole.
ST11 has 32 just from my list. And I'm sure I've forgotten some. How many glaring plot holes does it take before people recognize that this was a badly written movie?
One?
- Why is a training vessel the only ship in the quadrant?
- Why is the Genesis device, arguably the perfect weapon of mass destruction, left in an unguarded little space station?
- Speaking of the Genesis device, what the hell kind of hoaky pseudo science is that? An instant planetary "wave" that creates lifeforms and a functioning ecosystem? Ooo-kaay....
- How do Khan and his followers, from the 20th century, learn to operate 23rd century tech in a matter of hours? Does eugenic enhancement include precognitive engineering courses?
- Why is Khan, genetically enhanced super genius, unable to spot the transporter left active in the Regula I space station, and deduce that perhaps that's where Genesis went?
- Khan is told that they will lose Kirk if he goes into the nebula, and he fires one warning shot to stop him. (This was mentioned elsewhere but I can't remember who said it)
- a 23rd century vessel that depends on anti-matter annihilation for power has no better way of dealing with unaligned dilithium crystals than some guy going in there with gloves on?
We can go on. And I love TWOK. The point is, you can pick apart any Trek movie like this. What so many people on both sides of these arguments fail to realize is, these little nitpicks are just rationalizations for the deeper, gut reactions we have to the movies, things we usually aren't even consciously aware of. If we like the movie, we excuse the plot holes. If we don't like the movie, we use them as "proof" the movie sucks.
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I honestly don't know what you are going on about. Most of the things on your list of 'plot holes' aren't even plot holes and hardly constitute bad writing. I'm not saying Star Trek XI doesn't have plot holes, but your list of inconsistencies (most of which are more or less a result of directional decisions or production errors rather than bad writing) has nothing to do with them. Also, I'm pretty sure someone could easily compile a list of even more inconsistencies and plot holes from every single Star Trek movie – including The Wrath of Khan.
TWOK is not what I would use as a shining example of a coherent and intelligent script.
Still, as some have said, this film is about fun. It's big, loud, fast and funny. It is not far from a number of TOS episodes, though I think it's actually closer to a Voyager two-parter.
Still, as some have said, this film is about fun. It's big, loud, fast and funny. It is not far from a number of TOS episodes, though I think it's actually closer to a Voyager two-parter.
That's GodBen to you, you have not yet earned the right to call me Ben.
Irregardless, I never claimed that my opinion was the only valid one, someone made a claim that I have no sense of fun and I responded by explaining what my sense of fun is. If a person questions a trait of mine then they should expect a response along those lines, I fail to see what is so hard to understand about that.
My sense of fun doesn't matter anyway, the original claim was that this movie didn't have time to develop its plot properly because it was so jam-packed with character development. I pointed out that this is not the case by showing examples of three scenes in the movie which each ran for around two minutes and were not necessary for either character development or plot, they were just there filling time. Cut those scenes out or edit them down and you have 5 minutes to fix the plot problems.
Omega_Glory
Commodore
It seemed a bit too teenage oriented for me. Watched it twice. Cartoonish in some places. I am sure I'll watch the sequel, but certainly not the best Trek movie.....way down in the pack.
It's a pretty well-written movie, which is one of the big reasons that it's a success.
What you mean is that the plot is a bit convenient and coincidence-driven, which is also true. True of "Casablanca" as well.
What you mean is that the plot is a bit convenient and coincidence-driven, which is also true. True of "Casablanca" as well.
Quite so. Despite that, Casablanca gets a minimum of an annual screening at my house (usually more like 2-3 times a year).It's a pretty well-written movie, which is one of the big reasons that it's a success.
What you mean is that the plot is a bit convenient and coincidence-driven, which is also true. True of "Casablanca" as well.
It's just annoying that people are treating this as the Second Coming and anyone who criticizes the film or Abrams is immediately derided (or accused of not having a life, example above). The film wasn't all that well written, we don't have the script, so we don't know what ended up on the cutting room floor, we only know what they put up on the screen. And that film, the one actually shown on screen, is riddled with plot holes.
Casablanca is a spectacular movie. There's a few convenient coincidences there, sure. Compare those 2-3 to the quick list of 32 I just made. For you to actually compare Casablanca to ST11 is mind-boggling.
Casablanca is a spectacular movie. There's a few convenient coincidences there, sure. Compare those 2-3 to the quick list of 32 I just made. For you to actually compare Casablanca to ST11 is mind-boggling.
I can't speak for the others, but my point is that the plot holes and other contrivances are not a deal breaker for me. Moreover, there are other films, revered by many as classics, that have a serious number of plot holes and contrivances too. (the number of films without any is exceedingly small) Bringing up Casablanca is not intended (by me anyway) to equate the new Trek movie with it--I would not argue that in the least. But it has more than just 2-3 convenient coincidences (I don't feel like listing them now, I have children to attend to). The point of bringing it up is that even classics like Casablanca, if closely examined, have a number of flaws. To expect to be closer to perfection with a Trek movie (not that you specifically do, but some certainly do) is unrealistic and naive.
Beyond that, "badly written" is all-encompassing. I agree that some issues could have been better-handled. But much of the film works well (characterization, dialogue, individual moments--even if transitions between them are not always smooth) and too is owing to the writing. For some people (you, I would guess) the plot deficiencies are too much to overlook, for others (myself included) they are outweighed by other elements that make me willing to forgive the shortcomings. Certainly the film is not beyond criticism, but I find much of the heaviest criticism to be borne of unreasonable expectations in the face of the goals of the filmmakers.
It's a pretty well-written movie, which is one of the big reasons that it's a success.
What you mean is that the plot is a bit convenient and coincidence-driven, which is also true. True of "Casablanca" as well.
The question is less "is this film free of coincidences" and more "is the film written well enough that we don't care?"
I'm sure you can guess which side of the isle I come down on on that issue.
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