If somebody bests you and hurts you, you’re likely to carry a grudge, even if you provoked the confrontation. This goes double for Romulans.
This might be just semantics, but I'm not sure provocation is the right word. If it were, I'd surely agree because I can think of times in my life where I provoked someone and then suffered the consequences of it, yet I still held a grudge. But any instance I can think of is verbal provocation and not an actual direct, life threatening situation.
Such a situation might be if I shot someone, but didn't kill them, giving them time to shoot me back. I could understand perhaps having a knee jerk reaction at that point and me shooting back for a second time, but given a little bit more time to consider it, say 25 years, I think I could come to the conclusion that I really just brought it upon myself. Sure, that's not something a lot of people could do, but I think it's part of why it's hard for me personally to identify with such a character.
To me it seems like a character who bets his life savings on black and gets mad at the casino when it's red. I know some people can act like this, and even then I still find it hard to believe. I just can't relate to it at all.
I think you’re putting too much emphasis on the Kelvin as a motive. The story works just as well (as far as Nero’s motives are concerned) if it’s a comet that nails the Narada, so you don’t have to accept the idea of the Kelvin as a contributor to Nero’s Federphobia.
And perhaps Romulans should be different, but is there any indication that Romulans are needlessly vengeful? I've always thought them to be cold and calculating, and not maniacal. I'm not really sure there's such a precedent.
Excellent question.
The Romulans are introduced as pre-Surak Vulcans, who are regularly described as “savage.” The ones who left Vulcan and settled Romulus were those who rejected Surak’s philosophy that one should think and act logically.
I agree that most of the Romulans we’ve met are smarter and craftier than Nero, but then again, most of the Romulans we’ve met are Senators, Admirals, and spies, and Nero’s a miner.
You’re talking about holes in the plot. I’m talking about Nero’s motivation.
I understand what you're talking about. I just mentioned that your line of thinking opens up several holes in the plot, which is why I said it would raise a lot of potential problems. A good character may only raise a couple or no holes, and I don't think this is all that unreasonable of a goal.
I don’t see what one has to do with the other. The “holes” we’re talking about are unanswered questions about the story: How did Nero end up at Rura Penthe? How did he get out of Rura Penthe? How did he get his ship back? How was it fixed up? If you really want to know, there’s a
comic. Should the film have filled in some of these holes? Maybe. It certainly couldn’t have filled them all.
As for what makes a good character or a good villain, I think what we’re both looking for is a character we can understand or even relate to. The screenwriters and director need to get the necessary story pieces on screen, and the actor and director etc. need to make the connection with the audience so we can understand the character’s perspective on the story, what he’s going through and why he does the things he does.
We’re not likely to get
all that, because the movie isn’t about Nero. It’s about Kirk and Spock. Nero is there as a foil for them and you don’t want to develop him at the expense of more important characters, so the question is how well can they develop him without requiring a lot of extra screen time or attention.
I think the screenwriters did alright with this one. With the exception of Delta Vega, Nero’s actions are understandable and plausible, IMO.
I’m not sure whether you substantially disagree with that point. You seem to think it implausible that the Kelvin could contribute to Nero’s hate for the Federation while I think it plausible, but it doesn’t matter because his actions toward the Federation are believable either way. I dare speculate that given a futuristic weapon with which one can go around obliterating cities populated by Muslims, a substantial proportion of American miners would choose to do so.
(I realize that
you would not go around destroying Muslim cities, and you find it difficult to understand or relate to the kind of mentality who would, but you do believe that such mentalities exist, don’t you? And really, how many films are there where you can look at the villain and think, “I empathize with him and can see myself behaving similarly in a similar situation”? That’s extremely rare. Bad Guys are difficult to relate to by their nature.)
So the necessary story elements are all there. There is a straightforward and plausible explanation for everything Nero does (except DV).
One weakness of the way Nero’s story is written is that much of it is delivered in rapid-fire exposition on Delta Vega and in dialog whose relevance is not immediately obvious. (I imagine the majority of viewers who are not hardcore Trekkers leave the movie not even realizing that Nero and his crew spent 25 years imprisoned by Klingons.) I see why this might be a problem for the casual fan, but I don’t find it a problem for me because I know those parts of the story the casual viewer could easily miss.
So I don’t think the story is why the Nero character doesn’t work for me. For now, I’m blaming Bana. I may watch the movie tonight or sometime soon and we’ll see if that affects my perspective on this discussion.
