Reboot: Into Nerd Rage
One of my pals texted me today on how he didn’t like Star Trek: Into Darkness. I took exception — not to the fact that he didn’t dig it, as people can like or dislike whatever the hell they want. I did have to point out the flaw in his reasoning, though.
His main gripe was that J.J. Abrams has turned it into “Action Trek,” and how it’s no longer about exploration and strange, new worlds. This same friend liked all the Next Generation movies… which, as I pointed out, were guilty of exactly the same thing. They turned Picard from a peace-loving diplomat into a machine-gun-wielding dune-buggy stunt driver.
It’s not a flaw with the Star Trek movies. It’s a flaw with movies in general.
In a movie, you have two or so hours where you have to keep your audience engaged. In sci-fi especially, you have to keep things moving, as anyone who remembers the 28-minute scene of Scotty driving Kirk around the Enterprise in Star Trek: The Motion Picture will attest. If you don’t, your audience gets bored. Just like they did in 1978.
The Trek movies are a different animal than the shows, and that’s not a bad thing. There are more reasons than pacing, too — budget can play a big part, as it’s way less expensive on a weekly basis to have the crew sit around a conference table than it is for them to get in space battles.
I’m not sure if I made my case with my pal, but as I’m a fan of my own logic, I found my reasoning to be sound.
What about you, folks? See Star Trek: Into Darkness yet? What did you think?
(For the record, I dug it.)
47 Echo 
Going to see it on Sunday — and I don’t have any problem with action in movies. Like you said, it’s kind of necessary to keep people entertained. TV shows have the capability of character development and whatnot, because they have so much time on their hands, but movies are 2 hours. That’s nothing!
Finally saw it. Barely remember it. Fluff. Popcorn entertainment but insubstantial otherwise. The writing seemed more “clever” than good. And someone needs to help them with their plot implausibilities. I don’t mean bending and twisting science. Consider this. In the first movie Kirk pretty much single-handedly saves Earth from being destroyed (by the iffy red matter bidness) and then in this second movie, when he chooses to expose some primitive people to a starship for a few moments, he gets DEMOTED????? Sorry, that wouldn’t happen in a consisten narrative universe. I think the trouble with successful franchises like these is (can be) that no one is telling the writers/directors/producers “no.” They don’t have the need/ability to step back and self-edit.