Why did you like or dislike ST09?
- Thread starter Admiral Buzzkill
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Ask Axiom or Jeri.
I havent hit twenty yet. The only Trek film that falls in that range for me is TMP.
I haven't seen any Trek movie 20 times - life's too short.
Okay, I confess that I've seen a few TOS episodes that often. When I was a teen I would watch things a lot more times than I will now - I've seen the original Planet Of The Apes more times than I'd care to admit.
Okay, I confess that I've seen a few TOS episodes that often. When I was a teen I would watch things a lot more times than I will now - I've seen the original Planet Of The Apes more times than I'd care to admit.
Liked:
Most of the recasting, especially Spock.
That the writers knew which characters to keep the same (Spock, McCoy) and which to tweak (Kirk, Uhura).
The music.
The sense of high adventure and gripping action.
The cameraderie between the characters.
The sense of an optimistic future as embodied by Starfleet. They really nailed that.
The risk taking elements (blowing up Vulcan, Spock/Uhura). They took a chance and pulled it off.
The humor.
Nimoy's return for one last movie.
Setting the story in a new parallel universe, which frees up the writers creatively.
That they made a boatload of money and won Trek's first Oscar to boot, which officially establishes Star Trek as being back, baby, big-time!
Disliked:
Nero being such a generic villain.
The missed opportunity to give the poor Romulans some development at long last. They were Trek's original enemy alien species, yet after all this time, we still don't really know who they are.
Pegg as Scotty. Sorry, I just kept seeing Pegg, not Scotty, the whole time. I don't mind Scotty being comic, but Pegg was just doing his standard comic schitck. It might have worked a bit better if he'd invested a little effort into creating a comic character who isn't the same guy who shows up in all his movies.
The Star Wars rodent. Ech.
To bring this back to Star Trek, only about 1% of the audience would have known enough about Trek to have an opinion on the color of Kirk's eyes or the Enterprise nacelles, or even to know that there was a "right" color for such things.
Shocking confession time: I've still only seen it once.
I did get the DVD for Xmas, tho. Maybe I'll pop that in before the first anniversary of the movie's debut, huh?
Most of the recasting, especially Spock.
That the writers knew which characters to keep the same (Spock, McCoy) and which to tweak (Kirk, Uhura).
The music.
The sense of high adventure and gripping action.
The cameraderie between the characters.
The sense of an optimistic future as embodied by Starfleet. They really nailed that.
The risk taking elements (blowing up Vulcan, Spock/Uhura). They took a chance and pulled it off.
The humor.
Nimoy's return for one last movie.
Setting the story in a new parallel universe, which frees up the writers creatively.
That they made a boatload of money and won Trek's first Oscar to boot, which officially establishes Star Trek as being back, baby, big-time!
Disliked:
Nero being such a generic villain.
The missed opportunity to give the poor Romulans some development at long last. They were Trek's original enemy alien species, yet after all this time, we still don't really know who they are.
Pegg as Scotty. Sorry, I just kept seeing Pegg, not Scotty, the whole time. I don't mind Scotty being comic, but Pegg was just doing his standard comic schitck. It might have worked a bit better if he'd invested a little effort into creating a comic character who isn't the same guy who shows up in all his movies.
The Star Wars rodent. Ech.
The general movie-going audience wouldn't be able to tell you what "good writing" is to save their lives. They can, however, tell you when they are bored and sometimes that's because the writing is bad. And sometimes that's because there aren't enough car chases. They'll forgive anything in a movie as long as it's entertaining enough to be worth their ten bucks.
To bring this back to Star Trek, only about 1% of the audience would have known enough about Trek to have an opinion on the color of Kirk's eyes or the Enterprise nacelles, or even to know that there was a "right" color for such things.
Shocking confession time: I've still only seen it once.
I did get the DVD for Xmas, tho. Maybe I'll pop that in before the first anniversary of the movie's debut, huh?
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I was excited about the movie when it was first announced. I'm first and foremost a TOS fan and I was excited about the characters being given a new lease on life. I didn't have a problem with new actors playing the parts. The only thing I cared about was staying true to who the characters are, which is why I didn't end up enjoying the movie.
IMO, the character Zachary Quinto portrays does not, in any way, resemble the character of Spock. The only thing they seem to have in common are their names. I don't know if it's the fault of Quinto or the writers, but mostly likely it's a combination of the two. I thought the rest of the actors, with the possible exception of Pegg, did a pretty good job staying true to the spirit of their characters. Also, I though the script was a little dumb, even for a modern day Trek movie.
IMO, the character Zachary Quinto portrays does not, in any way, resemble the character of Spock. The only thing they seem to have in common are their names. I don't know if it's the fault of Quinto or the writers, but mostly likely it's a combination of the two. I thought the rest of the actors, with the possible exception of Pegg, did a pretty good job staying true to the spirit of their characters. Also, I though the script was a little dumb, even for a modern day Trek movie.
I liked that it was fun. I liked revisiting my old beloved characters with some new twists. I liked that it made Star Trek something you can talk about with a well-adjusted person with them going cross-eyed. I liked the modern re-invention of that world.
I didn't like that the plot was largely dependent on coincidences, the destiny angle didn't work terribly well for me. I didn't like that space wasn't awe inspiring. I didn't like the lack of any social relevance (even the cartoony sort that you usually get from Trek).
I didn't like that the plot was largely dependent on coincidences, the destiny angle didn't work terribly well for me. I didn't like that space wasn't awe inspiring. I didn't like the lack of any social relevance (even the cartoony sort that you usually get from Trek).
I thought Quinto was just about perfect. I didn't miss the "social relevance," which Trek has sucked at ever since the people making it decided that it was the show's signature contribution to the modern world. The couple of coincidences bothered me a little - I do think Abrams's one mistake in assembling the thing was cutting the extended version of Spock's conversation with Kirk in the ice cave, which at least addressed the coincidence there.
Well, I don't think it should be as blatant as "LTBYLB," and I don't think it was ever particularly ground breaking in that regard, but I liked that Trek used to be at least a little thought provoking for the ten year olds. I've been watching WALL*E with my daughter a lot lately, and I think that film did it just about perfectly.
Oh, I think that aspect of Wall*E was pretty heavy-handed, but the movie was so generally lighthearted that the telegraphed message didn't drag it under. In Trek's case I don't think back so much on TOS's late excesses now as I do messes like ST IV: TUC and many episodes of the modern Trek shows. The entertainment value of Trek has become inversely proportional to how much focus there is on making a political point or drawing a moral conclusion.
Just what is it that we're meant to learn about values and ideals from young people who live in southern California and write commercial entertainment?
Just what is it that we're meant to learn about values and ideals from young people who live in southern California and write commercial entertainment?
It just goes to show you how subjective this all is. We're both long time TOS fans (although you have a few years on me
) and we saw completely different things. I've only seen the new film twice, and the first time Quinto's portrayal rubbed me the wrong way. The second time around I was trying to picture Nimoy's version of the character behaving in the same way or saying the same things as the Quinto version, and it was just impossible for me. The funny thing is that I'm not particulary a Spock fan, I've always been partial to the Kirk character, so the visceral reaction I had took me by surprise. I thought Chris Pine actually did a pretty good job capturing the spirit, if not the specifics, of the Kirk character.
Yeah, that didn't bother me either. Not even a little.
I agree with this. That small explanation would have went a long way in making the story seem more plausible.
Yeah, and it's annoying because while some coincidences were written into the script, this was an instance in which the writers had tried to address the seeming coincidence head-on as something more - and it was just dropped in editing, leaving a hole which has become perhaps the most common complaint about the story even among folks who liked it.
Personally, that's one of the reasons I think makes Trek great, being an intellectual show, and among the things it does explore intellectually, are relevant issues. Sure, it didn't hit them out of the park every time. But it's willingness to do it is one of the reasons the show made such an impact.
But it didn't ALWAYS do that. Trek told all kinds of stories.
BTW, I LOVE TUC. And Wall*E.
It's not like "young people who live in southern Cali" are any more clueless about these kinds of stories than anyone else.
Oh, and yes, Quinto rocked the Spock.
Heh. Fair point.
I dunno, I just prefer entertainment that at least makes the attempt to spark some thought about something deeper than punching a Romulan- whether it be the simple messages of WALL*E and Avatar, or the political proselytizing of guys like David E. Kelley or Oliver Stone, or attempts to explore the human condition such as the works of Ingmar Bergman. And I really like the idea of introducing my daughter to entertainment that might send her little mind a-thinking.
I don't want to drag out the debate, though. This is a fairly minor complaint about a movie that I loved.
ETA: At the very least, I think the ending would have benefited from something like Doctor Who's "Killer or coward?" bit from the end of series one. I wasn't particularly thrilled with Kirk and Spock gleefully unloading on the already doomed Nero. I like to think that they are better than that.
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I loved Star Trek ('09) for one reason above all reasons: it made me feel like a four year old watching episodes of TOS, TAS, listening to Power Records adventures, and reading the Whitman reissues of the Gold Key comics with my MEGO action figures in my hand. To have that feeling of childhood excitement over something I dearly loved as a child was reason enough.
I think that stories best gain real, enduring depth not from trying to address issues but from digging as truthfully as possible into what someone (Ellison? probably older than him) called "the human heart in conflict with itself." Which is why I remember "The City On The Edge Of Forever" as the very best of TOS, while issue-oriented shows that I really enjoyed - like "A Taste Of Armageddon" - are definitely second tier for me.
The story for ST 09 doesn't achieve greatness by this definition either, obviously - perhaps falls a little shorter, in fact. It's only a pretty good script.
The story for ST 09 doesn't achieve greatness by this definition either, obviously - perhaps falls a little shorter, in fact. It's only a pretty good script.
Trek does that well, too. Those generally fall into the "good drama" Trek stories.
I think that stories best gain real, enduring depth not from trying to address issues but from digging as truthfully as possible into what someone (Ellison? probably older than him) called "the human heart in conflict with itself." Which is why I remember "The City On The Edge Of Forever" as the very best of TOS, while issue-oriented shows that I really enjoyed - like "A Taste Of Armageddon" - are definitely second tier for me.
The story for ST 09 doesn't achieve greatness by this definition either, obviously - perhaps falls a little shorter, in fact. It's only a pretty good script.
Ellison took the phrase "the human heart in conflict with itself" from William Faulkner's Nobel Prize speech.
Ha! I totally agree. They managed to lose the stuffiness that had been a staple of Trek for so long and deliver a rip-roaring space adventure. Starfleet should be the coolest job in the universe, involving as few meetings and conference table discussions as possible. Hell, I think the conference table should be banned from all future Trek productions. Lets see our heroes battling some robots or tentacled monsters with the fate of the universe hanging in the balance.
I'm tempted to say that I would love to see Trek attempt a planetary romance, but Avatar has set that bar pretty high.
I think that stories best gain real, enduring depth not from trying to address issues but from digging as truthfully as possible into what someone (Ellison? probably older than him) called "the human heart in conflict with itself." Which is why I remember "The City On The Edge Of Forever" as the very best of TOS, while issue-oriented shows that I really enjoyed - like "A Taste Of Armageddon" - are definitely second tier for me.
The story for ST 09 doesn't achieve greatness by this definition either, obviously - perhaps falls a little shorter, in fact. It's only a pretty good script.
Oh, I definitely agree with that. I'd be thrilled with a story that really delved into these characters.
Ooooh, I had never read that. Thanks for posting it.
Yeah, I didn't figure it was Harlan's originally - didn't contain any swear words. 
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