What NuTrek Got *Better* Than the Original?

[Kegg]

Uhura. She's a major improvement over the character in the original series, in all honesty, and as much as Nichelle made the role iconic and I grew up with it and so on. The relationship between her and Spock is miles ahead of his relationship with Chapel, also.

...and, uh, that's about it. Sure, there's a lot of stuff I'll agree it got just as good as Trek in the past, but that's all off the top of my head I'd unqualifiedly say it got better. It certainly benefits from the largesse of more advanced SFX and a big budget, I'll definitely give it that.

Also I found the action sequences uniformly bland and uninvolving, but that appears to be just me. The space scenes were similarly kinetic while being difficult to follow or connect with - few, actually no, images remain in the mind afterwards.

 

[Aragorn]

Based on some of the posts here -- fans?

 

[The Castellan]

These Starfleet professionals dress in uniforms that are so neat, clean, militaristic...

Never cared for millitaristic crap.

I liked all the activity on the bridge. Rather than four principles and an extra waiting to be killed, you have a large number of people running the ship. as a result the bridge looks more a like a central hub (like the C.I.C. on BSG or NASA's Mission Control as a real world example).

I liked the lens flares and sweeping camera movements during the outer space sequences. Its something TOS, TNG, etc never could have done, and it helps keep those sequences belivable and from feeling too stately or removed.

I'd never use NASA as a good example of anything.
And the lens flares and the camera moving every second was annoying....gimme a stable camera any time.

 

[CommanderRaytas]

For me, it's all about Pike. His fate in TOS never sat right with me, and the opportunity to play with him and Number One without the spectre of Talos IV hanging over them fills me with glee.

Agreed. Pike is teh hawt and teh kewlz.

Also, I really like the lens flare.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Uhura is improved. And I think this new Kirk may work out better than the old one did. The notion of Vulcans being an uncommon species, and Spock being more frakked in the head than originally, are both worthwhile concepts and I'm interested to see where they go with it.

Otherwise, the main improvement is that Abrams Trek will be around to give us new stuff to watch, which the old Trek won't.

Spock is hotter. HOTTER.

Agreed. And he had some real competition to beat, too.

I mostly just don't like the word racism being thrown at my favorite little Vulcans. They're self-important. They're ignorant on the subject of emotion. They're jackasses. I don't think they're racist so much as they as they are emotionist.

Vulcans are more violently emotional than humans. So where do they get off saying that it's Spock's maternalside he needs to worry about?

...but when ya think about it, the Vulcans' attitude makes sense psychologically. They envy humans for being able to have emotions and not have it destroy them. That's why they keep talking smack about those doltish humans. It's not racism, it's projection.

 

[JarodRussell]

Most shots ended so quickly I barely got yo register what was going on, not to mention having time to actually enjoy them. Go back and watch the TWOK fight in the nebula and you'll see what I mean. I obviously recognize that the new shots are "better," but I just dislike the style.

I exactly remember my reaction to the very beginning of the movie. Awesome Kelvin intro. Cut to Robau, as he enters the bridge, and you see NOTHING because of huge lensflares everywhere. Then Robau says "Polarize the viewscreen.", but then you can't enjoy the effect because it suddenly cuts to a closeup to his face. My thought to that was "Hey, I wanna see that!!!"

And there were MANY instances in that movie similar to that. Where you were blinded by lens flares first, and then couldn't see any of it because it cut to something else.

 

[Agenda]

Romance! Spock/Uhura will live forever.

 

[Wynterhawk]

Romance! Spock/Uhura will live forever.

Ahhhhh yes. My sentiments exactly.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Romance! Spock/Uhura will live forever.

Considering Trek's wretched track record with romance, the fact that Spock/Uhura isn't flat-out obnoxious and instead seems ripe with good plot possibilities is a victory in and of itself.

 

[Psion]

Anton Checkov

Who He?

I love how you edited out the apostrophe on my original post. True, I did typo Chekov's name in the first instance, but not the second.

 

[Biggshow]

Anton Checkov

Who He?

Late 19th C. doctor, short-story writer and playwright. His work as one of the early realists continues to influence modern dramatic storytelling. His last name is usually anglicized as Chekhov.

OT; OK, I'm going to say it. Chris Pine is a better actor than William Shatner. Which is not to say that Shatner is a bad actor I just think that Pine had more genuine human moments in this one movie than Shatner had his entire ST career, especially by the time he got to season 3, where even he admits he was just kind of phoning it in.

I believe this is a starmaker role for Pine and am looking forward to his future work.

 

[Agenda]

OT; OK, I'm going to say it. Chris Pine is a better actor than William Shatner. Which is not to say that Shatner is a bad actor I just think that Pine had more genuine human moments in this one movie than Shatner had his entire ST career,

I disagree, though. Season 1 Shat was especially incredible. Look at episodes like Balance of Terror or City on the Edge of Forever. Superb performances...imo.

 

[JarodRussell]

OT; OK, I'm going to say it. Chris Pine is a better actor than William Shatner. Which is not to say that Shatner is a bad actor I just think that Pine had more genuine human moments in this one movie than Shatner had his entire ST career, especially by the time he got to season 3, where even he admits he was just kind of phoning it in.

I believe this is a starmaker role for Pine and am looking forward to his future work.

I disagree entirely.

 

[Sovay]

I think one thing it got great was the view of the future. Of course this is something relative to the fashions of whatever time we're in, back in the 60's it was that blocky primary-colour look that was "futuristic", and of course these days this bright streamlined blue and white with lots of curves and smoothness is what's in fashion, but I think in XI there were actually people looking at technology and thinking rationally about the direction it's going (thin touchscreens, holograms, etc) as well as making it look practical. I keep expecting to see an Apple logo somewhere on the bridge.

I also like the nice view you got of Vulcan. It looked like an awful place in Amok Time, but in the movie they made it look alien yet natural, like it might actually be in reality... before destroying it of course.

 

[StarshipDefiant]

Multiple starship designsm TNG showed a couple as did VOY, and DS9 showed many, but this movie showed multiple designs of that era, which was just cool.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

I'll agree with others that said the added character backstory is better this time around. We actually know why Chekov is on Enterprise, for reasons other than is resemblance to pop culture icons of the time.



No...the ST11 Vulcans act like a bunch of racists, which is not in my view, a good thing at all. Even Enterprise, while showing Vulcans as extremely cautious, and more than a little conceited, never went that far. Furthermore, by showing an entire race as rascist, does that mean destroying them is more acceptable?

Really, it was just the children that behaved that way. Yes, that old guy described Spock as having a "disadvantage" because of his human mother, but I never necessarily saw it as racism. It was more a disadvantage because of his having to overcome his emotional nature.

Racism is more than cutting remarks. It's an attitude and belief system. The science council believed Spock's had a handicap solely because he was half-human. That is racism. That is why Spock told them, not in so many words mind you, to go off themselves as he goes somewhere that doesn't look down on him because of who his parents are.

Potentially he did have a handicap. The emotional instability is one huge handicap to Vulcans. Also humans seem far less able to do high level math in their head, a trait Vulcans seem to find fairly easy. It's the Science Academy, not the Art Academy and they might well question whether being half human would pass on what to Vulcans would be a learning disability. Humans are also 1/3 as strong as Vulcans and though this won't effect Spock's studies he would be seen as potentially physically weaker.

I would expect a Vulcan/Human child raised on earth to be seen as having great advantages academically and in sports. They really would be far ahead of their human peers. It's not racism for the Vulcans to honestly see that Spock is potentially quite disadvantaged by his genetics.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

Beyond Antares your avatar is great.. immediately reminded me of the hangar scene with Spock making a change on the modernized clip board as to what ship Uhura was assigned to and Uhura with that same pointed look on her face!

Nowadays TOS scenes are always giving me flashbacks to STXI.

 

[Agenda]

Beyond Antares your avatar is great.. immediately reminded me of the hangar scene with Spock making a change on the modernized clip board as to what ship Uhura was assigned to and Uhura with that same pointed look on her face!

Nowadays TOS scenes are always giving me flashbacks to STXI.

Thanks! I always thought those two had nice chemistry, even in TOS. Kind of like fire and ice. Too bad we didn't get to see more of it.

 

[DevilEyes]

No...the ST11 Vulcans act like a bunch of racists, which is not in my view, a good thing at all. Even Enterprise, while showing Vulcans as extremely cautious, and more than a little conceited, never went that far. Furthermore, by showing an entire race as rascist, does that mean destroying them is more acceptable?

How do you come to the conclusion that an entire race is racist, based on 3 kids and one guy from the Science Institute? I hate to think what you'd conclude about some real life nations, based on the behavior of a bunch of stupid teenage bullies and idiotic statements by old academics with their heads up their asses, only because you haven't talked to other people who might be smarter and more tolerant.

 

[DevilEyes]

Beyond Antares your avatar is great.. immediately reminded me of the hangar scene with Spock making a change on the modernized clip board as to what ship Uhura was assigned to and Uhura with that same pointed look on her face!

Nowadays TOS scenes are always giving me flashbacks to STXI.

Thanks! I always thought those two had nice chemistry, even in TOS. Kind of like fire and ice. Too bad we didn't get to see more of it.

Me too.