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Who Did The Best Acting Job in NuTrek?

Ultimately I have to vote for Chris Pine. Karl Urban channelled Kelley almost flawlessly, Quinto delivered Spock quite creditably within the parameters he was given, Greenwood brought a perfect elder-statesman warmth and humanity to Pike, and Saldana reinvented Uhura quite brilliantly. But Pine had to do by far the most demanding balancing act -- convincingly delivering something that would be recognizable as an alternate version of Shatner's Kirk without just imitating Shatner -- and he pulled it off with astonishing aplomb.

This.

I thought replacing Shatner was going to be the toughest thing for the new movies to do credibly. They hit a home run with casting Pine.
 
I think that they've all done really good jobs. It's hard to pick just one. That's one of JJ Abram's biggest strengths, casting and getting good performances out of his actors.

If I HAD to pick, then I'd pick Pine, Urban, Greenwood, and Cumberbatch. But again, they're all good.
 
Zachary Quinto as Spock

Spock had always been my favorite so it wasn't easy for him to win me :rommie: but he did.
His character is probably the hardest and the most intimidating to play.
I like his subtlety. Like the expression on his face when his father said that he married Amanda because he loved her, or the look he gave to the vulcan science academy when they insulted his mother, or the expression on his face when he mind melds with a dying Pike.
I love his Spock and I love his acting.

But really they are all good.
Urban and Saldana as well as Chris Pine also do a great job with their characters.


I'm not a big Zoe Saldana fan, especially turning Uhura into a whiny brat.

irony you're calling Uhura the whiny brat for essentially having the same agency the male characters have, all the while you think that McCoy, Kirk and Scotty are the best performances when the actors are basically asked to play characters who made 'whining' and 'complaining', and being generally unprofessional, their biggest traits.
I guess boys will be boys.. but Zoe Saldana makes Uhura whiny :rolleyes: funny how that works.





Urban as McCoy, Pine as Kirk and Pegg as Scotty.

I'm not a big Zoe Saldana fan, especially turning Uhura into a whiny brat.
''I totally agree about Saldana. She is nothing like Uhura should be. When NuUhura compained to NuSPock about not getting the Enterprise that was something Uhura would never have done.


1) Tos Uhura didn't have a romantic relationship with Spock, so expecting these characters to interact in the same exact way even though they are under different circumstances and have a different level of familiarity with each other is simply ludicrous. Yet, she's one of the most professional in these movies. If Uhura had acted with Kirk or Spock the way McCoy or Scotty do all the damn time, the fandom would ask her head on a silver platter.
I also love how people always complain about Uhura rightfully calling Spock out on his s**t for overcompensating, yet no one has a problem with McCoy sneaking Kirk aboard the enterprise or Kirk's behavior with his superiors.
from the premise, I can't even imagine what some of you think about Carol.
2) Tos was made in the 60s where it was already a lot that a woman could be more than eye candy and a woc didn't fulfill one of the stereotypical roles that were given to woc.

that said, I always find it funny when people say that tos Uhura would have never called Spock out on his s**t, basically. We're talking about the same woman who flirted with Spock (on the bridge and while they were working!) one moment and then had absolutely no problem calling him out on his coldness when he dismissed the death of a crew member (who could have been their captain and thus someone she thought was a friend for him).
And in tos she wasn't even his girlfriend.

She always had a bit of that directness that Spock has all the time and in every version of him. Probably, that's one of the reasons why her reboot counterpart can be his girlfriend.
 
Yeah I get the feeling that he likes that. Her assertiveness and willingness to challenge him, he probably finds it impressive. Just like I always got the sense that Spock enjoyed his "disputes" with McCoy in TOS at least to a degree (even if he'd never openly admit it).
 
The best acting might have been by any background actor/extra who didn't call attention to himself in the middle of a scene.
 
I liked them all, even Deep Roy, who wasn't given a whole lot to work with.

I am not sure of pegg's acting as he is the comic relief.
Perhaps you ought to have another look at the Delta Vega scenes in which Scotty is introduced. There's a lot more going on there than just comic relief.
 
^ My feeling is that he's (shall we say) more "comically inclined" in the 2009 movie, playing up to the actor playing him, whereas STiD gives Scotty a much meatier role that lets Pegg take him into a better direction.
 
Well, Simon isn't playing a dramatic serious guy role for sure. He is funny and comic relief. Maybe he is not just that because he has his moments, but he definitely is the actor with that role and who influenced the character the most IMO. I think even the rest of the cast and writers acknowledge that this Scotty is tailored on the actor.
I couldn't imagine him playing a dramatic role as convingly tbh and I sure hope that in the next movie he doesn't try too much giving to Scotty a role that doesn't fit with him.

Of course, the concept of 'funny' can be relative. There are characters that aren't designed as comic relief but they are funny to me. Mccoy for example has his moments. Spock is the super serious introvert man but I find his involuntary humor and sass funny.
Just the way he delivered that 'unclear' line :lol: the quote I use in my signature, that scene between him and Pike about 'giving attitude'. His sass and sarcasm are delicious. Spock always had a wicked sense of humor, I'm glad they try to keep it in the reboot.
I miss Chekov trolling everyone about Russia inventing everything, though :lol:
 
I think Zachary Quinto doesn't get enough credit around here for his terrific portrayal of a young(er) Spock.

Generally though I have to agree with LoB, I can't think of anyone who stood out in a negative way - it's a great, very even cast in terms of acting chops.
 
I've enjoyed Greenwood's performances very much in the two films also, he was a great choice for the role of Pike and lent the movies some much needed gravitas. .

Excellent point-the gravitas! :techman: Having Pike in an elder statesman role is an example of why a reboot can be good.
 
Generally though I have to agree with LoB, I can't think of anyone who stood out in a negative way - it's a great, very even cast in terms of acting chops.

I feel like John Cho had less to do in this movie than in ST09, which is unfortunate because I think he'd do well with more material to properly evoke Sulu. His big bad-ass speech to Khan on the bridge was most certainly a great reference/foreshadowing to the captain of the USS Excelsior.
 
I've enjoyed Greenwood's performances very much in the two films also, he was a great choice for the role of Pike and lent the movies some much needed gravitas. .

Excellent point-the gravitas! :techman: Having Pike in an elder statesman role is an example of why a reboot can be good.

Killing him off needlessly is bad though.

They didn't kill Pike off needlessly though. It served the story for both Kirk and Spock's character arcs.
 
I've enjoyed Greenwood's performances very much in the two films also, he was a great choice for the role of Pike and lent the movies some much needed gravitas. .

Excellent point-the gravitas! :techman: Having Pike in an elder statesman role is an example of why a reboot can be good.

Killing him off needlessly is bad though.
The Hero's Journey dictates The Mentor must die before the Hero can come into his own, it happens in every story, so, yea, not unnecessary at all. While the Mentor is alive, The Hero always has them to fall back on, and therefore can't fully become the Hero.
 
I think it's a good thing that nUhura was assertive and went after what she wanted, which I think is perfectly in keeping with the Uhura of the movie era, and especially STIII.

I think there was a way to make her more assertive without rendering her into the whiny/clingy/self-absorbed girlfriend or the pseudo-superhero trope who gets to beam down and strike action poses. I don't really see any depth there. I just see a more 21st century post-feminist trope.

Hero's Journey dictates The Mentor must die before the Hero can come into his own, it happens in every story, so, yea, not unnecessary at all. While the Mentor is alive, The Hero always has them to fall back on, and therefore can't fully become the Hero.

Which makes sense for Star Wars but feels a little out of place in Trek, especially juxtaposed with Kirk's forced "special birth" and being "the chosen one".
 
The acting has been mediocre at best in these movies. It's not necessarily the fault of the actors, more so the material they've been given to work with ―it never feels completely natural.

Bruce Greenwood has probably been the best. He's the Qui-Gon Jinn of Abramsverse.
 
The acting has been mediocre at best in these movies. It's not necessarily the fault of the actors, more so the material they've been given to work with ―it never feels completely natural.

Sounds like we're talking about the oldTrek TOS-based movies. Did anything thing in those ever feel at all natural?
 
The acting has been mediocre at best in these movies. It's not necessarily the fault of the actors, more so the material they've been given to work with ―it never feels completely natural.

Sounds like we're talking about the oldTrek TOS-based movies. Did anything thing in those ever feel at all natural?

Yes I think the interactions between TOS characters, in the movies, felt very natural for the most part. (There are some exceptions of course)

The TOS movies are unique in that you have a cast the that's known each other for over two decades. I think it helps add to that natural feel.
 
The acting has been mediocre at best in these movies. It's not necessarily the fault of the actors, more so the material they've been given to work with ―it never feels completely natural.

I thought the chemistry between Pine and Quinto was nearly as good as the chemistry between Shatner and Nimoy. They've actually done pretty well considering they've only had two movies (four years apart) to gel.
 
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