STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS - Grading & Discussion [SPOILERS]
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In the next movie, Kirk can turn into a tiger. Perfectly reasonable considring all the psuedo-science in Trek. Also, Khan's blood saving some girl has perfectly set up that ability.
Yes, but the point is WHY McCoy decided to inject the tribble with the blood in the first place. Having McCoy research Khan / Harrison and finding some link between him and the girl at the start would have been reason enough. It would have been a logical progression of the story thread and would have given McCoy something to do, besides getting his arm trapped in a torpedo.
Yes. After all, we saw the crew of Enterprise-D devolve into animals ("Genesis"), including Barclay becoming a spider. Data came up with a retro-virus that cured them all.
So, there have been far sillier things in Trek than blood that can restore health and life to someone.
It's just a matter of where one draws the line of "silly." Sobeit.
Oh, okay. Now I understand. As others have pointed out though, weirder things have happened in Trek-verse. Besides, what else would McCoy be keeping a Tribble for anyway if not experimentation?
I may be mistaken here but at least in one episode of TNG, Crusher was instructed to try to 'revive' someone who was dead. In my recollection she was too late. But the inference there was that it was possible. And of course Neelix was revived from being dead in VOY. And Scotty twice in TOS.
If you think set-up scenes are redundant, I have a thing or two to tell you about narratives.
Great! None of that has anything to do with what I was saying though.
It's not a set-up scene if you set-up one thing and then do an entirely different thing later on.
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I've been mulling it over and trying to understand a bit more why I felt so disappointed with STID and I've come to realise how one-sided its approach was to the only topic of social commentary it addressed; the war on terror. It's this whole war on terror topic which gives STID its apparent depth, insight and food for thought. If anything STID comes over as almost a subtle endorsement of the war on terror.
It comes down to the consequences (or lack of you) you see. After everything that happened in Qo'noS I'm surprised the Klingons didn't just declare war on the Federation. They would have all the reasons: a Starfleet ship trespasses in their territory, Klingon warriors/soldiers killed and so forth. They could have slipped in a scene about how a war nearly started or even a war has happened and that incident in Qo'noS played a large part in starting it. It would have been a very nice wrap-up to the consequences and magnitude of what happened, but STID tossed this aside.
Little or large, it is an omission, and omission which implies that it's okay to violate a state or nation's territory to catch the bad guys. I mean for a man of principles, it really bugs me that Kirk was so gungho about the mission to capture/eliminate Khan in the first place. It's all about shear gut instinct and it is hard to address principles when they are so detached from logic or reason. For instance you have Spock who wants to follow by the book, and yet he goes along with this dubious mission. Of course all of that is eclipsed by Spock beating up Khan.
STID is all about emotion, that takes precedent over everything else. Logic, plausibility, continuity and motives be damned! That's why things feel so forced and clumsy, it's why Kirk had to weep when Pike died as if Pike was some sort of family figure, why Spock had to go utterly ballistic and why Khan had to crash the Vengeance into San Francisco because... ? It's like the film is trying to beat you into submission with non-stop action, breakneck pace and heart-throbbing emotion. STID worked best in these scenes where it became analytical and was presenting a situation (without force-feeding it down the viewer's throat): Khan revealing his identity to Kirk, Admiral Marcus warmongering aims, Kirk and Pike in the bar, and of course Spock talking about why he maintains this emotional distance. The last scene was the only scene where I was rather moved, it was dignified if you know what I mean. I wish STID had more moments like that I really do, indeed it was probably the only actual bit of character development in the film that did not feel absurd.
It comes down to the consequences (or lack of you) you see. After everything that happened in Qo'noS I'm surprised the Klingons didn't just declare war on the Federation. They would have all the reasons: a Starfleet ship trespasses in their territory, Klingon warriors/soldiers killed and so forth. They could have slipped in a scene about how a war nearly started or even a war has happened and that incident in Qo'noS played a large part in starting it. It would have been a very nice wrap-up to the consequences and magnitude of what happened, but STID tossed this aside.
Little or large, it is an omission, and omission which implies that it's okay to violate a state or nation's territory to catch the bad guys. I mean for a man of principles, it really bugs me that Kirk was so gungho about the mission to capture/eliminate Khan in the first place. It's all about shear gut instinct and it is hard to address principles when they are so detached from logic or reason. For instance you have Spock who wants to follow by the book, and yet he goes along with this dubious mission. Of course all of that is eclipsed by Spock beating up Khan.
STID is all about emotion, that takes precedent over everything else. Logic, plausibility, continuity and motives be damned! That's why things feel so forced and clumsy, it's why Kirk had to weep when Pike died as if Pike was some sort of family figure, why Spock had to go utterly ballistic and why Khan had to crash the Vengeance into San Francisco because... ? It's like the film is trying to beat you into submission with non-stop action, breakneck pace and heart-throbbing emotion. STID worked best in these scenes where it became analytical and was presenting a situation (without force-feeding it down the viewer's throat): Khan revealing his identity to Kirk, Admiral Marcus warmongering aims, Kirk and Pike in the bar, and of course Spock talking about why he maintains this emotional distance. The last scene was the only scene where I was rather moved, it was dignified if you know what I mean. I wish STID had more moments like that I really do, indeed it was probably the only actual bit of character development in the film that did not feel absurd.
This is exactly why the movie is great. Humans acting like humans (this happened quite a bit in TOS).
And the Klingons have absolutely no proof that Starfleet violated their territory. The Enterprise is still in Federation space and the ship nor personnel used in the Kronos mission can be tied back to them.
STID cranks the emotion factor to 11, it was so strong I switched off because it was becoming drama for the sake of drama. The basis for all it is either weak, flimsy, overplayed or even non-existent. Yes it good to have emotion, but when it is so grotesquely taken out of context it loses a lot of impact.
I rarely go the cinema, and nearly all the films I watch are at least seven or more years old, I have to say that STID was the most OTT film I've seen in years. Maybe all films are like this now and because everyone watches them then they think STID is normal in that regard.
And the last thing I watched before STID was the Hobbit, and let me say the Hobbit had more or less the same emotional stakes and only once or twice did it become a little to over dramatic. STID is just incapable of subtly and this film (STID) would have been vastly better if it had toned down the emotions.
That just simply comes down to a matter of personal preference. I enjoyed Star Trek Into Darkness, during The Hobbit I was incredibly bored.
That just simply comes down to a matter of personal preference. I enjoyed Star Trek Into Darkness, during The Hobbit I was incredibly bored.
It had to be the pacing and you were probably expecting LOTR?
Though you could never say STID was boring...
Never was a Lord of the Rings fan, didn't enjoy the books I read and didn't enjoy the films. Middle Earth simply isn't my thing.
I think when we see movies, there is so much more to the experience than what we see on the screen. I'm sure that lots of people loved The Hobbit/The Lord of the Rings (I know my wife did) but I didn't. Sometimes our associations are so strong for something because it reminds us of childhood (I think this applies to my wife for Middle Earth stuff, me for Star Trek) that we can look beyond the perceived flaws that others find because we've simply found a strong slice of nostalgia. Sometimes you go to something that you thought you wouldn't enjoy but do because the power of the company your with (went to World War Z with the wife and enjoyed it far more than I ever expected). Sometimes you enjoy something simply because you have a pretty girl on your arm.
Star Trek Into Darkness was an incredibly flawed film, but when I watch it I feel like I'm five again sitting in front of the 25" floor-model color TV we had. For that alone, I find it an incredibly compelling experience because not many things have that power. YMMV.
Space drama was dramatic. Egads!
I can fully understand guilty pleasures, it's why I love ST Insurrection so much and why I feel Battlefield Earth is a decent film. I could have overlooked a rather dodgy plot if STID came with some juicy thoughtful and ponderous moments. Hell I like passion when it's combined with some great moral principles and a situation which ain't contrived. But I just think that after STID, we are not going to see scenes like this from Star Trek again for a long time...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjYkuJb40J0
Or... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uiJ_18Qib4A
That's what I've been pounding the table about. Those are two scenes which have emotional stakes far greater than STID, but they work so well because they never went overboard and all...
How is Picard not going completely overboard in that scene?
I think your grading Star Trek Into Darkness on a Modern Trek scale. The original show had big bombastic emotional characters. What we see on the screen fits perfectly with the Star Trek I grew up with.
Which is why some of us had such a great time watching it! I wish "Nemesis" had had an emotion factor of 11. They killed off my favourite character and yet I shed not one tear.
Ah, so perhaps this film was not made with you in mind?
You are no longer part of the cinema-going public, but it looks like JJ was partly successful because you did venture out for this film!
If I hear about a movie that intrigues me, no way am I waiting seven years before picking it up on DVD.
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