Didn't like the movie? How would YOU have made it?

I'll continue later.

 

Here's a semi-canon compliant idea:
-The movie starts with Kirk on a transport to somewhere, having flashbacks to his last mission, where he beat some Orion raiders that were attacking his ship.
-Bones shows up and jars him out of the flashback as they prepare to disembark with Gary Mitchell.
-Kirk gets command of the Enterprise from Pike
-The Enterprise has to escort some freighters carrying some valuable stuff (military supplies, but Kirk isn't told that) to a colony before it can go off exploring
-En route, the Enterprise and the freighters get disabled by a ship (let's call it the Marauder) disguised as a surplus Starfleet ship. Guys from the enemy board the freighters, steal the military gear and beam off.
-Meanwhile, some bad guys beam aboard the Enterprise and download classified info. Kirk hears about this and flashes back to the previous battle with the Orions and orders the security teams to mobilize. They get into a gun fight with the bad guys and both sides take losses before the bad dudes beam out.
-Aboard the Marauder, a Klingon passenger watches the action from a control room full of screens. It turns out he's behind this, having contracted the Marauder's crew through an Orion pirate.
-The Marauder heads to an Orion base, where the Klingon will get a ride into Klingon space after he pays the Marauder's crew.
-Once the Enterprise gets up and running, Kirk's first instinct is to go after the Marauder, but Spock reminds him that they have to protect the freighters. Mitchell and Spock start arguing over that, so Kirk decides to go on with escorting the freighters, but as soon as that's done, they'll go after the Marauder.
-Once the Enterprise gets to the colony, Kirk finds out what was in the cargo that was stolen and that Starfleet intelligence found a suspected Orion base in a nearby system's asteroid belt, so they sent the Constellation and a few other ships to the colony a few months before.
-Decker tells Kirk that they're going to take out the Orion base, which is a hollowed out asteroid, and lays out a battle plan that includes getting people inside the base to free any captives.
-On the Enterprise, Kirk assigns Gary Mitchell to command the ground team; Sulu volunteers to fly them down there and Kirk approves.
-The Starfleet flotilla arrives before the Marauder or the Klingon can get away. The Starfleet ships pick off the base's defenses before launching the shuttles, while the Orions launch as many ships and shuttles as they can to stop them.
-As the battle rages, Sulu's shuttle gets hit and crashes into a structure on the surface of the asteroid. Mitchell leads the security guys inside and they face off with the Orions. Sulu takes out a couple with a rapier or katana as they move through the base.
-The Marauder explodes out of a hanger in the asteroid and starts running for it. Decker tells Kirk to intercept it; as the Enterprise pursues the Marauder, it launches huge salvos of missiles from launchers disguised as asteroids.
-After the missile swarms manage to bloody up the Enterprise, the Marauder jumps to warp and launches some decoys and loses the Enterprise by pretending to be a decoy. Once the Enterprise passes by, the Marauder heads off to the Klingon border.
-Once Kirk realizes that he's been fooled, he heads back to the Orion base, knowing that pursuing the Marauder is impossible.
-The Marauder rendezvous with a D7 and transfers the Klingon, the stolen supplies, and the data. Both ships part, and the Klingon decides to look at the data from the Enterprise. This sets off a booby trap in the supplies that obliterates the D7.
-Back on the Enterprise, Decker tells Kirk that stuff like that happens and wishes him success on his mission of exploration. As the Enterprise leaves, Kirk wonders about the Marauder and how easily it beat the Enterprise the first time, leading him to the possibility that someone in Starfleet was involved.
-The Marauder's bridge is shown for the first time and it is revealed to be a Starfleet ship, working for some covert agency bent on getting Starfleet to militarize.

As for production design, the uniforms would be similar to STXI's, except the women wear pants; the phasers would actually have sights and trigger guards and look more like the ST6 assault phasers; I'd keep as much of the interior design as possible and just detail the exterior of the ship. If I have have to redesign it, I'd go with the smooth version of the Koernerprise:

 

Hard double returns are your friend.

Couldn't work on the big-screen my ass! Using that version would've been prefect.

 

The only complaint I could see with that version is that it's almost too busy. Most Enterprises are usually simple and accessible in their design, with an appropriate amount of sleekness... I've seen videos of Gabe's design flying around space and it seems to have almost too many points of articulation (far more complicated than seeing only one side from that above photo).

HOWEVER, when there was the Internet ruse that Gabe's design was going to be the JJprise, I nearly wet my pants as the design really truly is awesome.

 

I still hate that design, even if it has been modified to resemble the original better.

 

I don't think it would have been the RIGHT way to do it, but what I would have done is set the movie 85 years after Nemesis and have the cast play all-new characters, with Pine and Quinto playing the descendants of Kirk and Spock (yeah, yeah, you can hate me later). The tone and pacing of the movie would have been the same, but the look would have been 25th-Century. In the end, we still would have had a young Captain Kirk back in command of the Enterprise (albeit a future version) with a snotty Vulcan first officer. It would have been called Star Trek: Full Circle. There would be no time travel or alternate universe, but Nero being a pissed-off Romulan wanting to take revenge on a very old Ambassador Spock and the Federation for the fall of the Romulan Empire.

It's just what I personally would have wished, but otherwise I liked Star Trek XI just as it was...

 

I don't really know why so many fans hate this movie has JJ ruined your childhood or something

 

Star Trek's fan-longevity has mainly to do with one thing, its history and continutity remains the same throughout every series (i'm obviously ommiting Enterprise series, as it was a complete failure to fit into the bigger picture)

So many of us hate the new film because to break it down simply:

If your going to make a Trek film, then make a TREK film, not some ambitious directors idea of what he can make Trek INTO..

 

i would think that would have been IMMENSELY better than the prequel-dimensional garbage

 

I believe that line qualifies as a "troll." However, since it's on the "pro-movie" side of the debate, I'm sure it will pass without comment.

"Ruined your childhood" is such an overused comment in this light that it has, itself, become effectively a parody of those who use it. It serves only one purpose... to mock and diminish those who don't like the movie, attempting to couch all of their arguments as though they are just childishness... effectively, its use is a cheap attempt to portray the people towards whom it's directed in the same light as the adult who still plays with his teddy bear.

 

This would have been clearer, still, had the "Peter Preston" stuff in ST-II not been trimmed down.

See, while Saavik was a Lieutenant, Preston was still a cadet. A naval cadet is usually referred to as a "midshipman." Here's the definition for that:

So, the one other character in ST-II who has lines, and who is clearly younger and less experienced, has a rank which is entirely consistent with modern-day naval rank structures.

Peter Preston was a "trainee," a "cadet," a "midshipman." As were the overwhelming majority of those who were aboard Enterprise during ST-II. They wore different uniforms. Only one Academy student aboard Enterprise wore an officer's uniform, and that was Saavik. Because she was already an officer.

 

Get yourself a time-machine and tell that to Robert Wise and Nicholas Meyer.
A movie, any movie, will always reflect the ambitions and ideas of a director.

 

I disagree.

First off, "Batman Begins" was not "all about one character." While there was one primary character, this film (correctly) treated Jim Gordon as the "co-star" character. Which is the way he really should be treated. Other characters (Rachael, Alfred, Dr. Crane, Ra'as) were "major supporting characters," but as far as I'm concerned, Jim Gordon, in "Batman Begins," hold the same level of importance that Spock would have held in the story I'm suggesting. And in "The Dark Knight" they took this even a step closer to parity... it was as much about Gordon as it was about Wayne. As it should be!

And I also disagree about your description of "genres." A genre is only, again, a setting. Of course, I particularly dislike the concept of Star Trek being treated as an "action/adventure" movie. As I've said many times, the Star Trek I grew up with, have lived my entire life with, and love is NOT an "action/adventure" thing.

"Die Hard" is action/adventure. It's about gunfights, and big explosions, and wise-ass lines. I enjoy that sort of movie, don't get me wrong. But that's not what Star Trek has ever been... until this movie, that is.

When we choose "genre definitions" like you did, though, you're really putting the movie into a box. There have been some Star Trek episodes or films which had significant "elements of action/adventure." And in some cases, that worked, as part of a greater whole, very nicely. But in no case did a Trek movie fall entirely into that category. And off the top of my head, I can't think of a single episode which did... though possibly, because such hollow "action/adventure" episodes would have left me underwhelmed.

There were very clear "action/adventure" elements to "Batman Begins," of course. LOTS of them. The reason that this movie captured the imagination of the audience, whereas the prior couple of "Batman" movies did not, was that it treated the characters as realistically as possible, and focused on the PERSONAL, rather than on the "big 'splosions and kewl stuff" which the prior Batman flicks had done... and because it treated the source material with a level of respect which was almost "reverence."

Well, it's far easier to do an ensemble on TV, where you have 20-30 episodes per season.

When movie-Trek tried to be too much of an "ensemble," it usually failed. Shatner tried, way too hard, to do this in ST-V. The result of trying to give "every character something interesting" resulted in nothing good. Had this movie left the supporting characters in simple "supporting character" roles, and focused much more on the "troika" (and really, mainly on Kirk and Spock... McCoy in this films didn't have much to do in the script that got shot, did he?) I think that the film could have been quite a bit better.

And this is really back to the point... where this movie was treated primarily as an "action/adventure" film, whereas Star Trek, at its best, has never been that at all.

Star Trek has occasionally "lightened up" ("The Trouble with Tribbles," "A Piece of the Action") but those were, while fun, actually fairly hard to swallow as part of a "real" Star Trek world, weren't they? I enjoy those episodes... don't get me wrong... but viewed objectively, I think that they almost don't "fit."

The BEST Trek, IMHO (and according to most audience-surveys, I think most folks agree with me) were the ones that were (a) most character-driven, and (b) most serious.

"City on the Edge of Forever" is probably the single best example of this. Not a LICK of "action/adventure" in that episode, really. It took itself TREMENDOUSLY seriously. It was all about characters. It didn't so much as touch on the "big picture" - Kirk and Spock didn't go undercover, to Washington, to play spy and try to put things back as they were supposed to be. They stayed with Edith Keeler, and looked for McCoy... and that's all they did.

And it's widely accepted as the single best Star Trek episode ever.

Now, for a movie, you may well argue that you need some action... some danger, some tangible physical risk. I think I gave that (space is a very dangerous place, after all, and the passengers and crews of two "shipwrecks" trying to somehow survive a disaster has LOTS of dramatic tension!), but I did so INTENTIONALLY without introducing a "villain," or a "big climactic battle sequence." Those are overdone cliches, and while it's OK to have them occasionally, I really prefer focusing on the characters, not the "big kewl 'splosions." I hope you agree.

I see this as a false distinction.

For an example, look at "Band of Brothers." ENTIRELY "real life." Not "dull" at all.

I, personally, find "action for the sake of action" in a movie to be far, far more "dull." Your mileage may vary.

"Need?" I disagree. Each of the three "concepts" I toss out there are entirely independent. Each has its own premise, with a distinct beginning and a distinct resolution.

I'm afraid that you've latched onto that. So... just put it aside entirely. Ignore the "movies #2 and #3" I suggested, and treat the "treatment" I gave as a complete, STAND-ALONE concept.

The complaint may then be "well, it doesn't put Kirk on to the Enterprise, and does put the whole crew together."

In which case, my response would be "so what?" Why does the GENERAL AUDIENCE care about that? I really don't think that they do. AT ALL. They want an exciting story involving character that can care about and identify with. While it may be a "surprise" the casual moviegoer that you don't have Kirk on the Enterprise, at all, during this film, I doubt that they'd be remotely upset about that. Only the "geeks" would care, and among them, only a small subset, I think.

That argument only holds if you assume that the only people going to this movie are long-time, dedicated Star Trek fans.

This is another false assumption which has been made over the years by people on both sides of the argument... that somehow, "fans want something different from what general audiences want." I disagree. We weren't BORN "Star Trek Fans." We came to love it because it was great storytelling about characters we could care about.

I first debated this particular point several years ago... and I still see it as a false argument. Fans want the same thing that everyone else does... we just want a little bit more beyond that.


You keep saying "the audience wants an adventure." Well, how, exactly, do you describe "adventure." See, to me, "Last of the Mohicans" is very much an adventure, but clearly that is not what you mean when you use the term.

To me, every meaningful story... every story worth telling... which involves a hero having to overcome a major problem... is an adventure. The problem which must be overcome doesn't have to be "Mustache-twirling villain who plans to blow up the world." It just has to be something that is VERY PERSONAL to the characters we're watching, and which must require those characters to reach beyond their "comfort zone."

(to be continued due to BBS length limitations!)

 

To me, a character overcoming massive psychological baggage is pretty damned dramatic, and the whole "crew facing their own death plus the deaths of over a thousand innocent civilian" gives a tremendous sense of danger.

Have you ever seen the old movie "The Poseidon Adventure?" That was undeniably an "adventure," wasn't it? And yet, there was no "mustache-twirling baddie" or any "threat to destroy the universe" in that. What I was proposing more closely resembles THAT sort of an adventure than what I think you're getting at.

I think you're prejudiced in your comments here. Most of the best, and most popular, dramatic fiction (whether prose or film) has involved a blending of both. I think your comments indicate that you want "action/adventure" to be the central aspect of the film, with "character and substance" to be tacked on. Your earlier comment about "we already know these characters" is significant in this regard.

But as "Dukhat" mentioned in an other post elsewhere on this BBS, these aren't really the same characters at all. As he points out, this Kirk is essentially not the same man, AT ALL, as the TOS Kirk was.

This means that these characters MUST be treated as new characters, and the audience must be made to care about them, entirely, in the course of this movie. The fact that they have a few traits in common with some other character we already know is irrelevant... they aren't the same characters, nor are they intended to be.

If the characters are not fully developed in the course of this film, it is (as many people have said) just "kewl 'splosions." Which may meet the requirements of "action/adventure" but that's not what Star Trek, in the past, ever was. And that's why many people see this movie as not having had what, to them, was at the core of what made Star Trek worthwhile.

Did I say that? That's a perjorative comment. I don't know... did you miss the" lives of thousands lie in the balance" bit?

You seem to have a very shallow sense of what constitutes a plot. If there's not a villain with, with a big climactic battle sequence... if there's not a "mystery to be solved" with some sudden revelation of the villain's evil scheme... then, according to you, there's "nothing driving the plot?" Is that what you're saying?

THE AUDIENCE DOES NOT CARE ABOUT THE BIG EVIL SCHEME. THE AUDIENCE CARES ABOUT WATCHING CHARACTERS WHO THEY CAN RELATE TO WORK THROUGH A CRISIS. The exact nature of the crisis isn't as relevant as the fact that our characters are experiencing it.

Don't believe me? Go back and watch "Battle Beyond The Stars" as a great example of how to have a big "plot-driving element" and yet give no reason for the audience to actually give a damn.

Nonsense. And again, "chronicaling the loves of Kirk and Spock?" Very much a perjorative comment, having absolutely NOTHING in common with what I described. (The only "love" element tossed in came from the "Gary Mitchell" line about the unidentified blonde lab tech, after all!)

There is a crisis. A major, dramatic life-and-death situation that our characters are in. It's simply (and INTENTIONALLY) not one involving a "mustache-twirling baddie.

NONSENSE.

You really seem to draw a disconnect between "adventure" and "character" as if these are two entirely separate and independent things. I think it's completely obvious that this is untrue.

A film that plays the "adventure" aspects without the character aspects ends up as "Battle Beyond the Stars." A film that plays up the "character" aspects without the "adventure" aspects ends up as "Sex, Lies and Videotape." Neither of the above is remotely like Star Trek, historically, has been... though it's worth noting that "Battle" was a complete and total financial and critical flop, while "Sex" was a financial and critical success.

But no, Trek is neither of those things... or rather, SHOULD be neither of those things. Trek should be about characters, and how those characters experience and deal with various crises.

The "crises" need not always be "mustache-twirling villain blows up the world." Sometimes, they can be... but that should be fairly rare, I think.

Do you remember "The Samaritan Snare" from TNG? This was a GREAT episode... with a lot of dramatic tension and a very real threat. And yet, no "bad guy with a plot" at all. That's the sort of "threat" that this movie would have.

The story's relevance comes down to the fact that characters we care about have to deal with something that goes beyond their comfort zone, and has dramatic consequences for failure.

In a TV show, they aren't allowed to be significantly changed by their experience, which somewhat reduces the dramatic potential. We all know that Geordi and Picard and the gang will be back the next episode, same as before.

In this proposal, we know that the characters would survive... but we get to watch them change as a result of their experiences. That adds additional dramatic potential to the storytelling idea.

Again, nonsense. There have been MANY 2-hour movies that have easily met this standard.

Your statement only holds if you insist that "everything must be in the state we remember by the end of the two hour movie."

I not only do not "insist" on that, but I actively REJECT that. I do not want to see "everything in place" at the end of that movie. I want a realistic, believable PROGRESSION, with this movie being one step in that progression. We know the starting point, we know the ending point, and we get to see one stage of the journey in-between.

These things happen over time, not instantly, as we all know from real life.

This movie would give us the SEED of that friendship... it would establish mutual respect and admiration, and we'd be able to see where that friendship would grow from over time. It need not be "finished" at the end of the film, however.

I see the beginning of the McCoy/Spock feud starting here... Spock would argue that it would be impossible to save everyone, and thus, logically, they should strive to save as many as possible in as safe of a fashion as possible. McCoy would object, strenuously, to the idea of allowing even one person to die. EGO versus ID. And Kirk, being "superego," would make the judgement that, in the end, would meet the requirements of BOTH... and would impress both. (And, of course, Scotty would be the one who would figure out HOW to do it!)

Really, no, the Enterprise is not. It is a sculpture, or a machine... at most, it's the Maltese Falcon... a plot device. But it's NOT a character. Its relevance comes ENTIRELY from the attitude of the REAL characters towards it. And only two characters are truly passionate about it... Kirk and Scott.

Yes, I can, in fact. As much as I loved the Enterprise, I was prepared for Kirk, post-TWOK, to take command of the Excelsior. It would never be his "first love," but that change in dynamic is the sort of thing that gives these characters the chance to grow and remain interesting as characters.

Yes, easily. The Falcon is another ship which is relevant not because of itself, but because of the attitude of a REAL character towards it.

The way you may feel about the Millenium Falcon is really "the way you feel about how Han Solo feels about the Millenium Falcon," isn't it?

Had the falcon been destroyed in "Return of the Jedi" (which was originally planned), it would have given us a lot of potential for future storytelling involving Han Solo which was not used.

Of course, the death of Chewbacca in the novels has been used in very much the same way, except Chewbacca really WAS a character. The stories have not focused on Chewbacca, but rather on Han's reaction to Chewbacca's death. And this gave plenty of opportunity for worthwhile storytelling.

So, if Kirk had been given command of the Yorktown rather than the Enterprise... if only the NAME had been different... the show would not have been the same?

It's just a machine. A beautiful, sensible machine, but just a machine. The only "life" in it is that imparted to it by those characters who care about it.

Unfortunately, in ST'09, we didn't get the Enterprise, anyway. We got another ship called Enterprise, largely unrelated to the Enterprise we're discussing.

But that's another topic, isn't it?

As a PLOT DEVICE... as I describe below. The relevance of the ship itself, as far as "being there from the beginning" is concerned, is only my "point 1."

According to whom? According to the "general audience?

To the "general audience" it's just a "cool looking" (hopefully) spaceship.

VERY few people... including Star Trek fans... including ones like myself who've spent inordinate amounts of time developing the design into something as real as possible... think of it as though it's a person. I LOVE that design, but I don't think of it as a character. This movie didn't use that design anyway, so all we got in this film was the NAME "Enterprise." It lacked the physical appearance of the original (and, IMHO, lost most of the "beauty" of that classic design). And there was no "love for the ship" from Kirk or Scott, both of whom were the original characters who thought of the ship almost as being alive. Kirk just wanted to sit in the command chair, and Scott just "liked this ship." Neither was really "connected" in any way, other than "wow, aren't I great for being on this cool ship."

(By the way, if you want to see just how seriously I DO take this design... check out this thread: http://trekbbs.com/showthread.php?t=89810 )

 

of course it will, thats not what i said. the most important part of the statement was the last 6 words.

 

I am not being harsh but give the movie a chance sure what's wrong with taking both.

 

Okay, since when has TOS NOT had Kirk as Captain, and the Enterprise as a central part of the framework?

If this movie is meant ot be a Star Trek 101, leaving out the Enterprise, and Kirk being Captain is cheating the viewers out of the basic idea of what Star Trek had as a framework.

If the action scenes are simply events in the characters lives, then the action in any form really becomes pointless.

When something attacks a starship, an audience, ANY audience, wants to know more about it. What is it? Why is it attacking?

Although ST:TMP does not have a Bad Guy, it does have a mystery to be solved.

There is an overall, standalone Plot, a clear idea that can be latched onto.

With Batman Begins, we had an adversary that wanted to destroy Gotham for being Corrupt, there was a clear idea there.

There was also the Scarecrow, with his gas, that provided a direct challenge during the length of the movie.

Star Trek IV had the Whale Probe. Not a "heavy", but a threat that spawned the Adventure (yes, that again) of going back in time.

Star Trek as a series has always been an action-adventure show, though not every week was an adventure or action story.

Kirk fighting the Gorn?
The Enterprise in a cat-and-mouse game with a Romulan commander?
An espionage story with the Kirk working covertly to steal the Romulan Cloaking Device?

What is the overall, basic idea in your movie? A movie has to work isolated from the mythos, while introducing the basic premise. Star Trek 101: This is the crew, this is who they are.

In SEQUELS, once the introduction is done, we THEN get deeper into characters, and start telling other kinds of stories.

We know the crew, where will they take us next episode?

 

Cary, you like making long-assed double posts, don't you?

 

I think a message has a word limit here, so he's forced to double post.

 

Which should be a clue that the post is too long.