What Did You Think Of Star Trek? (Spoiler Discussion)
May 8, 2009 by Vic HoltremanNeed a place to talk about the Star Trek movie, including spoilers? Come on in…
Regular Screen Rant reader “790″ suggested I set up a discussion post for the Star Trek movie, where people can feel free to talk about all aspects of the film without having to worry about spoiling it for others. I had meant to set one of these up for Wolverine but just never got around to it.
Considering how popular I think Star Trek will be (moreso than Wolvie), I thought it might be a good idea to get this set up ASAP. 
So discuss the film below to your heart’s content!
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re: shields- perhaps sheilds (as we’ve come to know and love ,) have not been invented yet? maybe well see them in the sequel.
re: “the federation is involved with other things so we need to get the new cadets aboard”- well, certainly not original. wasn’t the used in star trek 2? heck, wasn’t almost every movie with the original cast a similiar situation that only allowed for young cadets or a “skeleton crew”….
About the Nero saying “Hi Christopher, I’m Nero” part was just a little bit of humor, he was kind mocking the way humans talk to each other. I guess if you don’t see it in English you don’t hear the tone of his voice and that kind of kills it.
And ANY scene with Uhura I’m fine with, because she’s so fine…
Haggislaw ,
i don’t think the romulans made’s spock ship . i believe it was the vulcans and that spock was actually on vulcan when romulus was destroyed. (but again, this was in the comic prequel)…..
@ Ken J
Yea that may be the case here…as i said have to watch it over again in o-ton. Still bothered me somehow =/
@ mike
but doesn’t the timing in that case still just plain sucks? i mean the ship was build after they knew that this star went apeshit in that system, right?
Average fan. 40 years old so know the show and all movies pretty well but wow was this a wasted opportunity. I agree and may overlap with several other peoples comments.
* Young Kirk in car portion LAME!
* Drama of Kelvin destruction wasted on mother being rolled around in a wheelchair going into labor right at that moment. Should have been played with her off ship on earth either being told by officers or listening in with infant Kirk.
* Academy portion completely wasted. This is my biggest issue. Why does first film deal with rookie crew saving the entire planet earth? Could have had a lesser evil villan intent. Not that these guys looked like nothing more than the Trench coat Mafia. Simple bunch of tatooed thugs jumping around in what could have been a cave. A simple hijacking or hostage situation during a training mission would have let us have more early character interaction and been fun to watch them outwit which is the Kirk way. First film of a so called mass appeal Re-Boot and we are dealing with timelines, black holes, and red matter.
* While on this heavy earth distruction issue, from what I can tell starfleet only needs these six or seven individuals to save the entire galaxy. All of the major hurdles were achieved by each one during this first movie having their I can do this moment.”
* Wow does the federation defense systems suck. Ship shows up and wipes out Kelvin with torpedos. Ship shows up later takes out entire star fleet. Then with advance warning from Kirk Enterprise comes out of warp and still gets knocked on its A*S.
* Just because we know original characters do we have to team Spock up with Uhura? ( My spelling may be off on several things but you get it ) Why not a new character or two to develop. I dont count Scotty and the the Ewok! Sorry another franchise I think these writers followed as opposed to Star Trek. Did you identify all the Star Wars moments.
Farmboy – Parents deaths – Death Star – Spock Obiwan moment
Failed light speed jump I would like to hear others on this.
* WHY BLOW UP VULCAN? First film out the gate.
* Totally agree with comment made about Kobiashee test. Although this was a light moment it came off to clunky and obvious that he reprogrammed the system.
ACTING I HAVE NO ISSUE WITH. Cast was true to characters and mannerisums. My wife was looking forward to youthful reboot also but felt was wasted on too heavy of a story that could have been fun. Maybe history will repeat itself and second one will have more Kahn fun!
dwrong,
re: failed lightspeed moment- jj abrams said that he was more of a star wars fan as a kid- maybe this was his “nod” to those films….
also- i think it was meant as character development for sulu. in time he becomes the great navigator of the enterprise that we all know and love- but you don’t become great overnight and without making mistakes. it does take time and practice (not to mention a few mistakes along the way). let’s not forget this was their first mission, and he was nervous, especially in front of captain pike-of course mistakes will be made!! .
A lot of good comments here!
@ Joshi,
I agree bud
@ mike w,
I didn’t read the prequel for that reason but I’m definitely reading the comics before seeing it again tomorrow.
@ docktorwu,
I totally agree and was thinking that myself. I had no clue why they started firing at a ship that couldn’t fire back and was about to be destroyed – to the point where they are just about to get sucked in themselves. I guess that was supposed to be dramatic but for a pretty dumb reason. That was also weird seeing how ALL the red matter was used to creat that black hole and it was the weakest one of the three in the movie.
@ Ken J,
More good points on the ship. The movie did not do well explaining Nero or developing him as the big nasty villain – that crew and ship didn’t feel very Romulan to me.
————–
I think this movie is like Iron Man, in that everyone loves it because its a big comeback for the franchise and because its new and flashy. Come sequel time, it won’t be so friendly, same with Iron Man 2.
Star Trek was good, but there are really a lot of little things piling up when I actually think about the scenes and the plot.
You should watch The Onion’s video story on Trekkies bashing Star Trek for being “fun” and “watchable” lol.
@ken j,
ah yes, now that i think about it- i believe you are correct .(about the ship being destroyed since the black hole was started inside the ship. )
Don’t get me wrong though, I still really liked it. I was never a Star Trek fan. I found them to have too much talk, not enough action. So many times they could have acted decisively in the beginning of the episode and there wouldn’t have been a problem, but they were too busy trying not to “make enemies” out of people who are already firing upon them or surrounding them with weapons at ready… Then of course, by the time they realize they can’t negotiate with them, something vital in their ship gets destroyed and now it’s too late to act, then it becomes reaction. I watched a few episodes here and there and have seen most of the movies, and almost every time I find myself thinking, “come on, just blow them up already” but of course, they don’t…
I think the flaws in this one is mainly due to JJ Abrams trying to develop so many characters all at once. The show probably had them develop over many episodes. This didn’t get that chance. So that would explain why the villain seemed so rushed, why so many crazy things happened that seemed like the only purpose was to introduce all of these characters and how they got to their positions in the ship that we know them to be, etc. etc.
Origins movies are always the hardest to get right, and I think with that in mind, this was actually very good, despite all of its flaws.
I have a theory about the red matter thing at the end how that black hole seemed weaker. All of the previous times the black hole was formed when some of the red matter was incinerated either in a super nova or the core of a planet. Basically in extremely high heat, aka extremely high energy. I think the size of the black hole can be proportional to how much energy the red matter absorbs before forming the singularity. In the final scene, the red matter was merely disrupted, and at the most absorbed some of the energy from the exploding missiles, but nothing more. So it could have resulted in a smaller black hole for that reason.
The one thing about the plot that I find hard to believe (even for a sci fi movie) is how a black hole will result in time travel. Because of the whole time paradox thing, black holes form all the time, if for every black hole results in another black hole sometime in the past, doesn’t that resulting black hole run the risk of altering history? So like what if a black hole forms, and its “past exit” hole forms right in the path of a planet, then would that planet magically disappear from the future timeline where the black hole formed? Or are they under the unlimited timelines theory that once something is changed in the past, it forms its own timeline separate from the one that caused the change in the first place?
Anyway, maybe I shouldn’t think so much about time travel paradox’s and movies, it never really makes sense, it didn’t really make sense for Terminator, but they are movies, so I guess we should just let that go, lol.
Mike w
appreciate your comment. Nods should not however be so obvious to cause eye rolling. Someone else mentioned earlier that you should not have to read a prequel to understand some of these issues in a mass appeal reboot or understand that Abrahms was a fan of Star Wars. I agree thought that Sulu kicks a.
Love everybodys comments about shooting at a ship being sucked in a black hole. I too thought why are you hanging around?
I enjoyed the film, the soundtrack was great with the exception of the rock tunes in the beginning. The space battles looked (not in a bad way) a lot of the space battles in BSG. It was interesting to see how the Kelvin’s demise altered the Star Trek continuum as well as Nero’s mining ship. I felt that the “Red Matter” was the films Mcguffen, in a way. I had to laugh when a single drop was enough to create a black hole yet when the entire mass was ignited it seemed to just create a similar size black hole. Destroying that much should have torn a massive hole in space. (O well).
Also I agree that in 25 years, not only did Starfleet not react to Nero, (unless I missed something) Nero didn’t age 25 years.
The acting was fine, Urban was convincing as was Quinto and Pine. Yetchen was amusing yet seemed totally thrown in just to complete the Original Cast. The relationship Spock had with Uhura is going to upset a lot of hardcore fans. I felt it was a way to humanise Spock to the new fans. Meh ?
I could see references to all the Star Trek films plus, Top Gun, Mission Impossible and others. At times I thought I was watching a reimagined “Wrath of Kahn” some of the shots toward the end were literally taken from that film. 5 warp cores ??? Lol.
Couple other things, the shields or lack of was addressed in the attack on the Kelvin as the first captain “polarized the hull”. This comes right out of Star Trek Enterprise’s technical specifications. Possibly the shields that we all know were also not invented yet as the timeline has been altered. The Enterprise crew said that shields were up and in the next scene debris is tearing into the hull. (Kinda lame).
Also, Scotty was basically sent to Hoth, (delta-vaga) because he transported Admiral Archers Dog in warp. I thought that was a nice touch. Scotty being given the advance details of warp transport was similar to when he provided the designs for transparent aluminum in Star Trek 4. There’s more I noticed but I’ll wait until those topics are brought up.
What I hated,,,
The inside of the Enterprise looked “bad”. Having it look like the inside of a nuclear power plant didn’t work for me. The Photon Torpedos were 1/10th the size as should have been larger.
Biggest scene that I hated, “The kobyashi Maru test”. That was seriously over the top in a bad way. Having Kirk eat the apple as a way of defiance was laughably bad. (IMO).
Other probs I had were many, yet at the same time I liked the film overall.
I don’t plan on watching it again in the theater (IMAX) if that says anything. I did notice that overall the audience enjoyed the film as there was a applause afterwards.
If you stay all the way to the end there is a dedication to the Roddenberry’s that I really thought was a touch of class.
This film will re launch the franchise. Nice job Abrams. Oh and the Lens Flare didn’t bother me.
Hey, don’t hate, this guy destroyed an entire planet and tried to destroy another one. I would have taken the opportunity to “kick him while he’s down” as well. You’re saying you wouldn’t?
Dwrong,
yes, i agree with you but it is a ship , he is the navigator, and it was warp speed- i think it would be impossible to not go for the character development angle w/o getting comparisons made to star wars. ,( and i was one of those people who mentioned that although the prequel helped me to better understand the film- it should not be necessary). i wonder how upset and confused i would’ve been had i not read it before hand.
i ended up reading the superman returns prequel after i saw the movie and felt that more of that info should’ve been incorporated into that film. the same goes for this one.
Oops, forgot to specify, my comment is regarding those who thought it was ridiculous for them to fire on Nero’s ship as it was being torn apart by the black hole.
I don’t need to go on too long.
Thought it was awesome. I’ve never truly cared about the team of the Enterprise more than I did in this film.
I especially loved the Spock/Kirk bromance. I thought it elevated the film well above being “just a popcorn flick.”
I can’t wait for a 2nd and 3rd voyage.
After reading a lot of the comments here I’ll add this:
The kind of nitpicks people are making here is a testament to how accomplished of a reboot this is.
The only really legit (read: non-geeky) nitpick I see (on first survey of the comments) is the whole Kirk ending up on the same planet as Old Spock Gimmick.
But hey, fate and destiny (and destiny rebooted) were supporting cast members anyway…
Camera angle gripes? Gimmie a break! It was shot pretty frickin well. And the spin shots had a retro sci-fi feel to them. I dug it.
Oh no, here we go again with the what are “legit” opinions and what aren’t… *sigh*
Yours aren’t. I’ve seen the scores on your opinion legitimacy tests. They don’t qualify.
(kidding, kidding)
Lol, a table should be made, and graphs, to support our opinions.
Like many here, even though there were details that bothered me, overall my enjoyment of the film as a whole drowned those nitpicks out. I’ll definitely see it again.
BTW, read the prequel if you want your questions answered about Nero and his ship. And I was told that in regards to the 25 year issue that for 20 of those years Nero was in prison on the ice planet from Star Trek VI. That was shot but cut from the film and will no doubt end up on the DVD.
Vic
Did anyone else think the slug thing Nero put in Captain Pike was a waste of screen space? It was never talked about again, and was not important in advancing the story. Why would Nero need Pikes perimeter defense codes anyway? Clearly his ship was powerful enough to overwhelm the defenses. It was a tacky attempt at references Wrath of Khan.
Yah, I am pointing out the things I thought were flaws in this movie but I actually said I would have rated it 4.5 out of 5 instead of just 4 out of 5, so clearly I liked this film, same deal with TDK, I pointed out plenty of flaws but I also really liked that film. No movie is perfect, they all have falws, we are just mentioning them with the hopes that either someone has an answer to clear it up in case I understood it wrong or whatever, or just to have a conversation about it. Nothing wrong with that. Like the whole issue I have with Nero’s ship being armed to the teeth despite being just a mining vessel, I was wondering if maybe I understood the timeline wrong. People keep mentioning the prequel book, does it say why and when the mining vessel was outfitted with so many weapons??
Meribor, LOL, that creature even had the same look.
Let’s not forget the Star Wars reference on Delta Vega were there’s always a bigger creature,,, very subtile. (Sarcasim)
There were a number of scenes pulled right out of other Star Trek films and other movies in general. I guess that’s how those guys write movies.
They were able to basically use the Kobyoshi test as template to change the Star Trek timeline/canon outcome buy cheating…
Interesting message, I wonder what Gene would think?
@Meribo
I think it was their way to injure Pike enough to force him into retirement (him in the wheelchair at the end) without having to show him being tortured or anything like that. The damage to the brain stem from that creature could probably lead to lower extremity paralysis.
OK, just came from it and I will agree that it is 4/5. It’s not the best Trek movie but it is definately the best movie this year, so far. I agree with many of the gripes here but I do have a couple of Trek-verse physics problems
1. I remember reading somewhere that a warp field within a planets gravity is extremely risky. This technique has been violated though in Trek 4 and TNG
2. Didn’t Spock say to McCoy in one of the movies that Vulcan had no moons?
3. Orbital diving just went against not only Trek physics but basic physics. Those guys entered a planet’s atmosphere without experiencing the friction from re-entry. The suits could have explained why they could survive it but we didn’t even see the effect
4. That anti-matter explosion to help the Enterprise escape the singlarity should have destroyed the ship
5. How did the Enterprise get back to earth without anti-matter? OK, another starship brought some (I guess) or towed them
I would say this was the fourth best of the Trek movies with Trek 2, 8, and 4 being numbers 1, 2 and 3.
Ken, Romulan ships have a rep as always being heavily armed.
Even as armed as it seemed, it didn’t display any futuristic military tactics. As in beaming through the lesser advanced Enterprise shields wouldn’t be a prob. The ship should have been able to lock Spocks ship in a tractor beam, or at least been able to beam the “red matter” on board. Also where were his phasers?, all he ever shot were lame green torpedos.
There was a million things wrong with this film, but it was fun.
Lol, Pike in the wheelchair at the end made me laugh!
It also reminded me of the end of Star Wars “a new hope”
Fans of the Original Series will get the wheelchair gag and it was funny, yet lame at the same time. The whole film was like that.
It truly was an alternate version of Star Trek. Also I hated the “FRINGE” font they used to describe the locations…
Ok I’m offically in nit-pick mode.
lmao! for any alias fans… didn’t the red matter look VERY familiar?