Twelve Reasons I Love Star Trek Into Darkness

ST09 is the greatest movie ever made.

Well, to me. Personally. I love it with all my heart. I love it as much as Firefly. I wish there were 13 episodes of ST09 that I could watch over and over again and have favorites of and name blogs after and have as comfort food.

 

2009 is an awesome, awesome movie. Like I've said before, ST09 and STID constantly jockey for first position. They are both fantastic, and so much fun, and YES I would love 13 episodes of ST09 to watch!

 

If you combine the films and watch roughly 20 minutes a week you can break it up into 13 "episodes".

 

It also presented a (rather mild, thus typically Trek-ian) allegory for "coming out".

 

Is it time for this video again? YES YES IT IS

[yt]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZORNVGFcUsc[/yt]

 

*slaps Nerys Myk in the face out of indignation*

Actually, that's not a bad idea.

*slaps Nerys Myk in the face out of appreciation*

Yes.

 

I think I'm getting turned on.

 

Today is a good day to..

 

It's like the Clapper.

Like Google, my mind filled in the blanks with a 1000 different search terms.

 

Each one more fun than the last..

 

Just as long as it's not the clap.

 

And the morally questionable nature of drone strikes.

 

As others have said, ST09 was a coming of age movie. It also addressed nature versus nurture. Isn't that enough?

But must there always be a message? I mean, every story needs a theme, it's just whether or not there's an intent for the story to convey a message as well, or address a contemporary issue. Still, can't we just sometimes enjoy a vanilla ice cream cone without having to contemplate its place in the universe?

In TOS, where were the deep and heavy messages or themes in "The Trouble with Tribbles", "A Piece of the Action", "Tomorrow is Yesterday", "Amok Time", "Where No Man Has Gone Before", "Balance of Terror", "I Mudd", or "Space Seed"? I could name more. And those are popular top ten episodes with fans.

TOS entertained, first. The degree to which it tried to get across a message was problematic. And frankly, TOS hardly addressed heavy issues. I think STID was the most message-loaded Trek, ever while still telling an entertaining story and advancing the characters. 'Splosions and a message (and Alice Eve in a bra and panties). Now that's kewl. It's ice cream with sprinkles.

 

Great thread, BillJ!
I agree with all your points. I'll add a few of my own, although they're more on the nerdy side...

Earth
It's amazing. I've always wanted to see busy cities in Trek's world, but of course they could never afford to show more than sleepy back streets and a tranquil academy campus. Yes, it's not much different from the world's of other futuristic sci-fi blockbusters or ours today, but I love it nonetheless - and it's implications for the rest of the Trekverse. Picard stuck in traffic or Worf waiting for a bus is at once ridiculous and awesome.

Also, no nudist parks where kids take their pet tigers. Always a big plus.

The details
Even the virtually illegible background graphics and signage tell a story. There is an insane amount of detail, and none of the endless anime or Buckaroo Banzai references that typified TNG-era screen graphics (in a movie featuring Buckaroo himself, no less!) It's all Star Trek, drawing on a half-decade of rich backstory, and goes a long way to making the world feel alive. Newscasters talking about unrest on Andoria and culture clashes going on across the sector, damage report graphics referencing technology detailed in Mr. Scott's Guide to the Enterprise. I've had far too much fun spotting them all. It's another whole layer of fun for hardcore Trekkies.

Nerdy questions answered
-Endless debates about continuity of timelines settled (officially, at least) by a display of Trek models on the Admiral's desk.

-Remember "The Immunity Syndrome", where Spock felt the sudden death of 400 Vulcans? Turns out he felt those 6 billion die in ST'09 too.

-Khan is shamelessly from 3 centuries ago. No attempt at retconning Trek into our world, they embraced Trek as a universe unto itself.

 

As it should be.

 

Where was this?

Yes, tigers and nudity don't mix.

 

I would have definitely been disappointed if the Eugenics Wars had been retconned to take place later. There is no reason why Trek and the real world's history has to be the same.

A shame no one has given a shout out to Sulu's time in command. It was really well done too.

Soooooo many things to love about Star Trek Into Darkness.

 

This link has close ups of the newscasts which played in the background of Pike and Marcus' offices. Here is my nerdy annotated version.

 

I don't want to seem ungrateful, but I can't figure how to get your annotated version to be big enough to read; it's all pixellated blur. Have you got any suggestions?

 

That is totally cool!!

Great details

This is the newsfeed at the bottom, did you add that as what was being spoken or was it there originally KingDaniel?

Organian peace treaty disputed on eve of founding of Sherman's Planet:Mysterious wreckage discovered on mountainous surface of Galorndan (sp) core:Magustan Pachangara elected Chancellor of Coridan system: Khtitomer discove:

It says "Unrest on Andoria Prime" at the very bottom in white with "status update" under it.

Looking at this makes me want to live in the future.