Nicholas Meyer Chimes in About Into Darkness

[suarezguy]

He elaborates a little in a previous interview...

"...I have nothing but respect for what [JJ] does. But it’s so different from… I don't see Spock as a guy that goes around slugging people and just sort of hitting them again and again and again. None of these people seem to be the same characters that I was asked to deal with. I know what II is about. II is about friendship, old age and death. I know what IV is about. It’s about extinction. It’s about taking care, ecologically, of the only home that we have. I understand what VI is about. It’s about the collapse of the Soviet Union, and it’s about change and fear of change and “Have we reached the end of history?” as Francis Fukuyama wrote when the wall came down. Those are the themes and the ideas of those three movies on which I worked. I don't know what the ideas are in the new Star Trek movies. I understand that they’re rebooting them, but that’s a mechanic chore, that’s a technical chore."

http://www.startrek.com/article/exclusive-interview-part-iii-nicholas-meyer-on-todays-trek

Count on Meyer to be blunt yet try to be balanced and respectful. I agree that too much in the reboot films feels like change-for-the-sake-of-change but that is the risk when most of the originals of what you're redoing were so well-done.

And an Orci reply:

"Theme is parable on war on terror. Most crtitcs pointed this out. Spock punching people is exactly the point. Fear and hate can lead our “logical” side to act vengefully, when we should be more above it. Agree or disagree, there’s the plot theme.

And yet the tone of the scenes seemed to be that the audience should cheer on Spock not only catching Khan but beating him, that Kirk had been wrong for merely stunning Khan and that not killing Khan was at least primarily wrong only because of the chance to save Kirk.

 

[JWPlatt]

@fireproof78

There's nothing deep about a rip-roaring action adventure film. It is what it is - entertaining. Hiding behind a rationalization - such as what Orci might be doing in denial, or as I mentioned out of a defensive reaction to allowing himself to be convinced by Lindelof to run with Kahn - just adds insincerity to the dog pile of criticism.

The homage was laughable, because I did. Out loud. If it added something, it was humor. Parody was mentioned in a post above. I guess if credit is due, it is for achieving a film that is a parody of itself. That's not an easy thing to do.

 

[LutherSloan]

I was actually enjoying STID until that last act and the blatant reversal of the WOK death scene. Up until that point I liked how things had progressed. The end took it down a notch for me.

I also feel like it would have been a lot better had they used a different Augment this time instead of Khan, since that carries a lot of baggage, and in this universe Kirk and Khan never met before, so it takes away any real impact. You could have put Kirk up against any other Augment and it would have had the same effect. But reusing Khan here seems cheap to me.

 

[Random_Spock]

I was actually enjoying STID until that last act and the blatant reversal of the WOK death scene. Up until that point I liked how things had progressed. The end took it down a notch for me.

I also feel like it would have been a lot better had they used a different Augment this time instead of Khan, since that carries a lot of baggage, and in this universe Kirk and Khan never met before, so it takes away any real impact. You could have put Kirk up against any other Augment and it would have had the same effect. But reusing Khan here seems cheap to me.

That's where I'm at too, only I didn't like the film over all. It just felt lacking to me. Mainly acting wise imo, but it does make a difference. I liked ST2009, since the actors actually put in an effort.

The second one just looked as if they had shifted into cruise control and phoned in their performances. It was a huge disappointment, because to be honest, I was looking forward to watching it.

Add in the Khan plot, and it was just that much worse.

 

[Set Harth]

It just felt lacking to me. Mainly acting wise imo, but it does make a difference. I liked ST2009, since the actors actually put in an effort.

The second one just looked as if they had shifted into cruise control and phoned in their performances. It was a huge disappointment, because to be honest, I was looking forward to watching it.

I just watched some of it earlier today and some of the acting felt like it was up there with the best in the franchise.

 

[Smellmet]

I agree, when Pike dies, I think Pine's performance here is excellent. As controversial as the reactor scene is - I'm in the belief that they shouldn't have done it, it is decently acted.

 

[CaptainMurdock]

I thought the acting was top notch. Yeah the Story is sketchy in some places but it's still fun. I'd have removed Khan and the augments altogether and wouldn't have had Quinto yell KHAAAAN. It's still an entertaining romp.

 

[Smellmet]

I think Bruce Greenwood's presence will be sorely missed in the next movie too. He has been very solid in the two movies, like he usually is in everything he's in.

 

[fireproof78]

He elaborates a little in a previous interview...

"...I have nothing but respect for what [JJ] does. But it’s so different from… I don't see Spock as a guy that goes around slugging people and just sort of hitting them again and again and again. None of these people seem to be the same characters that I was asked to deal with. I know what II is about. II is about friendship, old age and death. I know what IV is about. It’s about extinction. It’s about taking care, ecologically, of the only home that we have. I understand what VI is about. It’s about the collapse of the Soviet Union, and it’s about change and fear of change and “Have we reached the end of history?” as Francis Fukuyama wrote when the wall came down. Those are the themes and the ideas of those three movies on which I worked. I don't know what the ideas are in the new Star Trek movies. I understand that they’re rebooting them, but that’s a mechanic chore, that’s a technical chore."

http://www.startrek.com/article/exclusive-interview-part-iii-nicholas-meyer-on-todays-trek

Count on Meyer to be blunt yet try to be balanced and respectful. I agree that too much in the reboot films feels like change-for-the-sake-of-change but that is the risk when most of the originals of what you're redoing were so well-done.

And an Orci reply:

"Theme is parable on war on terror. Most crtitcs pointed this out. Spock punching people is exactly the point. Fear and hate can lead our “logical” side to act vengefully, when we should be more above it. Agree or disagree, there’s the plot theme.

And yet the tone of the scenes seemed to be that the audience should cheer on Spock not only catching Khan but beating him, that Kirk had been wrong for merely stunning Khan and that not killing Khan was at least primarily wrong only because of the chance to save Kirk.

I'm not sure I felt the same tone of cheering Spock on, so much as I didn't want the bad guy to get away. For me, I was not wanting Spock to beat the crap out of Khan, but I didn't want Khan to escape and cause more death and destruction. I know that is not Spock's motivation at the time but I'm not cheering for him. YMMV

Also, Spock's death was logical - he was qualified to make the repair and his Vulcan physiology would allow him to function longer than a human. Kirk's death was illogical - he's not an engineer but of course ordering someone else to his death would make Kirk look like a b*stard so he has to go himself even though he lacks the expertise and is physiologically more likely to collapse before literally kicking the ship back into shape. Because the scene looks more contrived and we've already seen the get out of jail free tribble, the death didn't really work for me. Serenity did its death scenes much better IMO.

I feel the exact opposite. Spock's death in WoK never made much sense to me - in a room full of engineers in full radiation suits, Spock grabs just some oven mitts and wades into the radiation chamber. I seriously doubt Vulcan physiology is tougher than a full suit. The film didn't seem to build to it - he just gets up and does it.

Wheras Kirk, he kept himself together while the ship was going to hell, and he'd already shown himself more than capable of reaching the inner core in his journey through the falling, tumbling Enterprise. The film builds to his sacrifice from the start with the recurring question, how far would he go to save the people important to him? Tom Harewood, Khan and Admiral Marcus are willing to kill; Kirk is willing to die for his people.

I would imagine Kirk and Spock are both trained in engineering repair work, even though neither showed it prior to their sacrifice. We never knew what Spock was doing inside that pipe, but Kirk's repair was straightforward and he sees on the monitor and is told by Scotty exactly what needs to be done just before going in.

Saw both Kirk and Spock do engineering stuff in TOS.
There weren't heaps of qualified engineers in TWOK. the Enterprise was manned by trainees. Kirk said it several times during the movie.

And I can't see that either the TWOK or STID situation was more simple. Spock didn't look like he was doing heaps of Engineering calculations in TWOK.
Also PrimeSpock had 20 years experience in helping fix up the Enterprise in TWOK, nuKirk had 6 months if that.

nuKirk also had the chief engineer letting him know exactly what the problem was, and what needed to be done to fix it. It wasn't just a, "I can fix that!" moment, but doing the Kirk thing-getting information from qualified individuals and making a decision. Since it was a suicide mission, Kirk choose to sacrifice himself, and not ask anyone else to do it.

Also, Spock's death was logical - he was qualified to make the repair and his Vulcan physiology would allow him to function longer than a human. Kirk's death was illogical - he's not an engineer but of course ordering someone else to his death would make Kirk look like a b*stard so he has to go himself even though he lacks the expertise and is physiologically more likely to collapse before literally kicking the ship back into shape. Because the scene looks more contrived and we've already seen the get out of jail free tribble, the death didn't really work for me. Serenity did its death scenes much better IMO.

I feel the exact opposite. Spock's death in WoK never made much sense to me - in a room full of engineers in full radiation suits, Spock grabs just some oven mitts and wades into the radiation chamber. I seriously doubt Vulcan physiology is tougher than a full suit. The film didn't seem to build to it - he just gets up and does it.

Wheras Kirk, he kept himself together while the ship was going to hell, and he'd already shown himself more than capable of reaching the inner core in his journey through the falling, tumbling Enterprise. The film builds to his sacrifice from the start with the recurring question, how far would he go to save the people important to him? Tom Harewood, Khan and Admiral Marcus are willing to kill; Kirk is willing to die for his people.

I would imagine Kirk and Spock are both trained in engineering repair work, even though neither showed it prior to their sacrifice. We never knew what Spock was doing inside that pipe, but Kirk's repair was straightforward and he sees on the monitor and is told by Scotty exactly what needs to be done just before going in.

Well said.

nuSpock needs people to die before he can understand that they are friends. You don't wanna know what Uhura had to do before they got hot and heavy.

Honestly, I don't even see Kirk and Spock as friends in the JJ films. Old Spock said they would become friends, and that's pretty much it. If there's character material that shows why or how or when these guys are friends, I missed it. Maybe it happened in the year between cadet Kirk becoming a captain and his little Lost Ark adventure on Niburu?

I don't think they are friends, but they are building towards that friendship.

It isn't that Kirk needed to die in order for Spock to recognize the friendship, but that Kirk needed to make a decision that Spock would do in his place. Spock would have chosen to die, to save the ship, while Kirk, in the beginning, would have found some way, including breaking the rules, to get out of it. It's the acceptance of the possibility that one person should die that many might live, actually a similar attitude that Spock expressed when Enterprise lost power, and Sulu refused the order.

It shows a unity of purpose that Spock finally recognizes them as being friends. It just happens that Kirk dies in the process.

 

[CaptainMurdock]

I think Bruce Greenwood's presence will be sorely missed in the next movie too. He has been very solid in the two movies, like he usually is in everything he's in.

Agreed. He's a fine actor. I loved his performance as Pike. We got to see a more human side of him.

 

[Lance]

And yet the tone of the scenes seemed to be that the audience should cheer on Spock not only catching Khan but beating him, that Kirk had been wrong for merely stunning Khan and that not killing Khan was at least primarily wrong only because of the chance to save Kirk.

For sure. That's the thing: I found Kirk's handling of the Khan situation very 'Star Trek', and I admired his maturity in not just handing Khan over to Marcus when he was ordered to. But instead of exploring this further, the movie just seems to switch gears, and abandons the moral complexity, in favor of simply removing Marcus from the picture and then sending Spock down to beat on the bad guy and "win".

I think Bruce Greenwood's presence will be sorely missed in the next movie too. He has been very solid in the two movies, like he usually is in everything he's in.

Agreed. He's a fine actor. I loved his performance as Pike. We got to see a more human side of him.

Thirded. I've always been a bit of a Pike fanboy though, so it's been nice just to see a little bit more of the man than we did in TOS.

 

[Pauln6]

nuKirk also had the chief engineer letting him know exactly what the problem was, and what needed to be done to fix it. It wasn't just a, "I can fix that!" moment, but doing the Kirk thing-getting information from qualified individuals and making a decision. Since it was a suicide mission, Kirk choose to sacrifice himself, and not ask anyone else to do it.

I feel the exact opposite. Spock's death in WoK never made much sense to me - in a room full of engineers in full radiation suits, Spock grabs just some oven mitts and wades into the radiation chamber. I seriously doubt Vulcan physiology is tougher than a full suit. The film didn't seem to build to it - he just gets up and does it.

I would imagine Kirk and Spock are both trained in engineering repair work, even though neither showed it prior to their sacrifice. We never knew what Spock was doing inside that pipe, but Kirk's repair was straightforward and he sees on the monitor and is told by Scotty exactly what needs to be done just before going in.

Well said.

It shows a unity of purpose that Spock finally recognizes them as being friends. It just happens that Kirk dies in the process.

I agree that in TWoK the issue was as much that most of the engineers were inexperienced trainees with about as much experience as NuKirk and NuChekov in engineering.

While NuChekov might be able to explain the problem to NuKirk, it doesn't automatically follow that he will have the skills to fix it when he gets there and sees the exact cause. He takes yet another huge gamble that playing the hero will pay off.

However, that IS the persona that Kirk eventually develops in TOS. One of the points of TWoK was that it doesn't always pay off as well as you'd like. I openly confess that I prefer the Kirk in the early episodes more, where he is less of a diva.

Pike's death had more pathos for me, not that I was completely unmoved by Kirk's death. With less blatant homage and a different set up that involved someone else a bit more qualified sacrificing their life as well, I would have felt it a bit more.

 

[Franklin]

Also, Spock's death was logical - he was qualified to make the repair and his Vulcan physiology would allow him to function longer than a human. Kirk's death was illogical - he's not an engineer but of course ordering someone else to his death would make Kirk look like a b*stard so he has to go himself even though he lacks the expertise and is physiologically more likely to collapse before literally kicking the ship back into shape. Because the scene looks more contrived and we've already seen the get out of jail free tribble, the death didn't really work for me. Serenity did its death scenes much better IMO.

I feel the exact opposite. Spock's death in WoK never made much sense to me - in a room full of engineers in full radiation suits, Spock grabs just some oven mitts and wades into the radiation chamber. I seriously doubt Vulcan physiology is tougher than a full suit. The film didn't seem to build to it - he just gets up and does it.

Wheras Kirk, he kept himself together while the ship was going to hell, and he'd already shown himself more than capable of reaching the inner core in his journey through the falling, tumbling Enterprise. The film builds to his sacrifice from the start with the recurring question, how far would he go to save the people important to him? Tom Harewood, Khan and Admiral Marcus are willing to kill; Kirk is willing to die for his people.

I would imagine Kirk and Spock are both trained in engineering repair work, even though neither showed it prior to their sacrifice. We never knew what Spock was doing inside that pipe, but Kirk's repair was straightforward and he sees on the monitor and is told by Scotty exactly what needs to be done just before going in.

+1

Nailed it.

 

[fireproof78]

Also, Spock's death was logical - he was qualified to make the repair and his Vulcan physiology would allow him to function longer than a human. Kirk's death was illogical - he's not an engineer but of course ordering someone else to his death would make Kirk look like a b*stard so he has to go himself even though he lacks the expertise and is physiologically more likely to collapse before literally kicking the ship back into shape. Because the scene looks more contrived and we've already seen the get out of jail free tribble, the death didn't really work for me. Serenity did its death scenes much better IMO.

I feel the exact opposite. Spock's death in WoK never made much sense to me - in a room full of engineers in full radiation suits, Spock grabs just some oven mitts and wades into the radiation chamber. I seriously doubt Vulcan physiology is tougher than a full suit. The film didn't seem to build to it - he just gets up and does it.

Wheras Kirk, he kept himself together while the ship was going to hell, and he'd already shown himself more than capable of reaching the inner core in his journey through the falling, tumbling Enterprise. The film builds to his sacrifice from the start with the recurring question, how far would he go to save the people important to him? Tom Harewood, Khan and Admiral Marcus are willing to kill; Kirk is willing to die for his people.

I would imagine Kirk and Spock are both trained in engineering repair work, even though neither showed it prior to their sacrifice. We never knew what Spock was doing inside that pipe, but Kirk's repair was straightforward and he sees on the monitor and is told by Scotty exactly what needs to be done just before going in.

+1

Nailed it.

Seconded.

 

[Nerys Myk]

TWOK's version seems to be , "oh wait, we were supposed to kill Spock!!!!!"

 

[austen_pierce]

Spock didn't look like he was doing heaps of Engineering calculations in TWOK.

Spock had already done heaps of Engineering calculations in TMP, outclassing the best Starfleet had to offer, manning the brand spanking new ENT refit. The precedent is there.

 

[Mordock]

For sure. That's the thing: I found Kirk's handling of the Khan situation very 'Star Trek', and I admired his maturity in not just handing Khan over to Marcus when he was ordered to. But instead of exploring this further, the movie just seems to switch gears, and abandons the moral complexity, in favor of simply removing Marcus from the picture and then sending Spock down to beat on the bad guy and "win".

I didn't read it that way at all. In fact, I thought it was an important thematic beat; Spock is seeking revenge for Kirk's death, but the only way to save Kirk is for him to choose to spare Khan.

 

[Count]

I was disappointed that the movie ended up being a cliche "double cross" style ending. For a moment there I really thought Orci & co were going to strike out and do something unique, turn Khan into a hero in the movie along side kirk, making his betrayal in a future movie seem all the more impressive. And considering how we as a fanbase knew Khan's backstory, it would have been quite a bit different from TWOK and Space Seed's storyline to have seen Khan and Kirk actually as an allied team, but no, they fell to plot convention and turned him into a bad guy in the end, which i thought turned ID from a TWOK homage to just a rip off.

 

[Cadet49]

For sure. That's the thing: I found Kirk's handling of the Khan situation very 'Star Trek', and I admired his maturity in not just handing Khan over to Marcus when he was ordered to. But instead of exploring this further, the movie just seems to switch gears, and abandons the moral complexity, in favor of simply removing Marcus from the picture and then sending Spock down to beat on the bad guy and "win".

I didn't read it that way at all. In fact, I thought it was an important thematic beat; Spock is seeking revenge for Kirk's death, but the only way to save Kirk is for him to choose to spare Khan.

It was interesting to see Kirk and Spock flip perspectives on the concept of revenge versus justice and a fair trial - at the beginning of the mission to get Khan, Spock had argued strongly to spare Khan and return him to Earth for trial, when Kirk so strongly wanted revenge on Khan for killing Pike; yet, at the end of the movie, it is Spock seeking revenge on Khan for his actions, and Kirk arguing against giving in to revenge, during his speech at the memorial. It was an interesting deeper theme in the movie.

Just as I found it interesting how in ST09 it was Kirk arguing to spare Nero and his crew when they got trapped in the black hole, and Spock, suffering emotionally from the loss of his world and mother at the hands of Nero, who didn't want to see Nero rescued. This is a very different attitude between the two characters that their points of view in the TOS episode, Arena, where Spock was arguing that the Gorn should nor be destroyed after their attack on Cestus III, when Kirk wanted to destroy them as a warning to prevent further attacks. It was the intervention of the Metrons in that episode that convinced Kirk to see a different perspective, from the Gorn point of view, so that they could perhaps "talk", as he said.

While I have my problems with nuTrek, I don't agree with the opinions that it lacks deeper themes - they just aren't always as apparent as they were in the original series, perhaps... we don't have the benefit of the scenes at the end of each episode, where Kirk and Spock would be philosophizing on the bridge as the ship warped away, to outline the theme of the episode clearly (though I think nuKirk does a pretty good job of it in that end speech at the memorial.)

 

[Synnöve]

"The film didn't seem to build to it - he just gets up and does it."
"The film didn't seem to build to it."

Hmm.

I'm currently recalling a situation whereby I found out a piece of food had escaped the watch of a friend and had proceeded to play host to all manner of flora in said friend's house. The sights, the sounds, the smells... they had a certain beauty to them in terms of how something so complex could arrive out of such a seemingly simple circumstance.

After this thought proceeded out of my cortex it was immediately succeeded by another more pressing thought: "Okay. I'm going to leave this right here and depart before I vomit".