I agree wholeheartedly. Overall, I enjoyed the movie and the performances - but the villain was not well hashed out. Didn't like what they did with the Romulans, didn't understand why Nero was so intent on destroying the Federation (they didn't detonate that star, did they?), didn't understand why Spock was chosen to single handedly use "red matter" to stop the stars explosion...it just didn't make a whole lot of sense. Why, if you have access to that red matter, wouldn't you just use your jump to the past to suck the star into a black hole before it can destroy Romulus? Then everyone wins.

I'm now scared to see this movie. With all the hype and trailers . . . Am I in for a let down at 12$ . . .

if you don see this movie then you are a communist.

Umm... no one was sent 25 years back in time. Nero traveled from 2387 to the 23rd Century. Nero waited 25 years for Spock to exit the anomaly then captured him and put him on Delta Vega to witness the destruction of his home planet. Get your facts strait SciFi Wire, please.

Darcseid,

Don't be scared. Seriously, in my opinion, best Trek ever. IT will definitely be $12 well spent.

Darcseid,

I agree with j-dub. In fact I ended up spending over $20 jus' so I could get two back-to-back shows in! It truly is the best Trek ever. Bar none.

Darcseid,

I agree with j-dub. In fact I've already made plans to see the movie again this weekend! It truly is the best Trek ever. Bar none.

redman11 with a name like that in the 1950's they would have put you away for being one. Sci fi wire only 11. the ship, the uniforms. but i do say thank you for proving me right. it is even now as we are reading and typing tanking. I do suppose that this weeekends box office will be huge, however next week will be the true test. I'm very sorry for all of you who didn't like the movie.

How can Scotty beam them to a starship traveling at warp and is now by then many lightyears away. Would have worked better if the Enterprise was repairing their warp engine so still around and Scotty just beamed them up. Make the problem that shields were up that future Spock would know how to get around the older tech to get them through.
Also, Kirk made it from Cadet to Captain of the Federation Flagship with 3 years training at the academy. He was right, when he told Pike at the bar that starfleet was hard up.
Lastly, they kept mentioned "lightning storms" in space which grated me but that was caused by the time travel so one when Nero came back and he destroyed the Kelvin, one for Spock's arrival but no reason for one with the Klingon attack or at Vulcan as the Romulans where just using regular warp drives.

Darcseid - Don't be scared. Reread the first paragraph of this article then go see the film and judge for yourself. True, all of the 11 points here are truly WTF but even so it's ST in grand tradition.

The cast (with perhaps one exception) did an excellent job of capturing the essence of the original characters and are, for me, believable early versions of the TOS characters we love.

The plot, in spite of the 11 points cited, is compelling and clever. It reboots the franchise in such a way as to allow for complete freedom to tell new stories and retell old ones without being completely hamstrung by the existing, self contradictory, cannon. A cannon I love and respect but which make it increasingly difficult writers to create stories that weren't mired in over 40 years of back stories.

The upgraded look can arguable be forgiven due to the advancements in cinematic technology since the 1960s (and a modern movie budget vs. the modest 60s TV budget of the original). Still, in many ways the design of the film did invoke the feel of the original.

All and all, it's not the way I would have done a modern reboot of ST but I in the end I agree with Mr. Mill. I'm in, and I'm ready for Star Trek 2.

j-dub: You're right. An oversight; we've fixed it.

I did love the film though and will see it twice and I am ready for Star Trek 2

11. Kirks clown hands - just comic relief pure and simple. Which seem to work - the audience was in hysterics with that whole medical mess =).

10. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. Didn't really bug me that much.

9. This could go both ways - who knows how much a distortion or interference that kind of drill would cause. It drilling all the way to the planet core - thats alot of energy consumption.

8.As far as a mining ship armed to the teeth. Any other non Romulan Mining ship - I would agree, they wouldn't be so armed. But this is a Romulan ship - they are warfaring species like the Klingons. Of course they are going to be loaded with guns.

7. I agree with that - she should've told someone...

6. I think they explained that at the beginning - he was picked on as a kid. That could enduce some kind of depression. And negative emotions can be so much stronger and harder to cover.

5. I agree with this as well - BRIG - not enough in the budget to create the set? But basically it was done to move the story along and intro Spock and Scotty.

4. Again I agree but see 5 above.

3. Should've made it top 10 things...and left this off.

2. Why are the Romulans intent on destroying the Federation?? The guy who wrote this article even watched Star Trek at all????? Ever??? The romulans have always hated the Federation and wouldn't pass up a chance to destroy them.

1. Entertainment Value... and because nothing like that monster has ever been shown in Star Trek. Wanted to be different I guess.

You're right.. after seeing the trailers for this movie, I want to go watch Star Trek 2 as well. TWOK was awesome.

Unless you missed the 1 in front of 2, meaning Star Trek XII? This one was XI (11).

I agree, the movie is awesome. But, like I said to my friends after watching it last night, I'm not sure I like the potential ramifications.

It was a great movie, and my 65 yo mother attended just to see how they did Bones. She never goes to movies.

Why do we over scrutinize our enjoyment? It was great!

O.k., here is the real trick to making a star trek movie. it's not a great story; although it was, it's not great special effects; although they were. it's making the sexless MIT grads happy. Do that and you have a great trek movie; which it is

O.k., here is the real trick to making a star trek movie. it's not a great story; although it was, it's not great special effects; although they were. it's making the sexless MIT grads happy. Do that and you have a great trek movie; which it is

WTF--Uhura and Spock kissing on the transporter didn't make this list--seriously!? I have no problem with their relationship, as a matter of fact I thought the lift scene was great, but kissing in the transporter room, in front of everyone--no way. I even let it slide that Uhura kept leaving her post to run after Spock...

I didn't see it yet, but I hope they didn't dumb in down for the American Audience, (Like they had to do to new Battlestar Galactica tv series) because the world wide audience is much larger.

Was I the only one that saw the significance of Kirk eating an apple during this third and final attempt at the Kobayashi Maru simulation.

Agreed on all counts.

And what was up with Uhura chasing after Spock like a groupie? Didn't she have a job to do on board? Everyone else was busy doing something but she's reduced to a love interest.

It made her look silly and unprofessional.

I see there are a ton of BLIND JJ Abrams followers posting to the boards.
This movie was so bad:
1) Canon Canon and Canon. WTF? they blew up Vulcan and murdered Spock's mother.
2) What happened to Kirk being a Lt. on the Farragut?
3) Kirk goes from being a cadet to Captain of the Enterprise. WTF happened to Ensign, JG Lt, Lt., Lt. Commander, Commander?
4) JJ Abrams just decided to wake up and spit in the face of traditional Star Trek fans? I understand about updating something but with all of the canon that he violated there is no possible way that it can tie in with existing Star Trek. I can think of at least three episodes speifically that CAN'T happen now because of what JJ did in the movie and the entire first two seasons when Chekov wasn't on board the Enterprise.
5) Put the damn camera in one place and film the action. I HATE cinematography where the camera is moving more than the action. Makes it very difficult to follow.
Somebody really should have gotten Mr. Frakes to work on rebooting the Franchise.
So all you blind Abrams followers go ahead and ridicule me for my thoughts but jj really didn't do justice to long time Star Trek fans

First, loved the movie! Spoiler coming:
The biggest WTF for me was the destruction of Vulcan! That's just a step back from Earth being destroyed as far as the Trek Universe is concerned. They made Star Trek 3 to bring back THE Vulcan, Spock, now I hope they make an effort to bring back 6 Billion of his fellow Vulcans by going back in time or something in the next movie. In this case the needs of the Many (6 Billion) outweigh the needs of the few...

11. As someone noted, a crowd-pleasing sequence that helps establish the Kirk-McCoy dynamic.

10. Wonka-esque? Probably the most realistic engine room of all the ST set pieces.

9. It's a large scale piece of future-era technology--Nero jams comm and transporters--where's the problem?

8. Again, future-era techno--not a big leap.

7. Was there an implication there that she may have been overstepping herself and therefore reluctant to come forward ?

6. Huh?

5. Kirk was not supposed to be on board in the first place. Kicking him off seemed kinda . . . logical.

4. Kirk and Spock were both attempting to reach the nearby Federation outpost. Their proximity to each other and ultimate encounter wasn't that much of a stretch.

3. Again -- huh?

2. Uh, like any good villain, Nero has gone a little mad and in his grief needs to blame someone. (Similar to Khan?) His motives and actions don't necessarily have to be rational. Besides, he's got 150 years to figure out how to save the planet. In the meantime, why not destroy the Romulans' age-old adversary?

1. What's the big deal? It injected an exotic sense of setting and a dose adventure--something that has often been lacking in ST endeavors.

Just another juvenile attempt by Sci-Fi Wire to be fashionably snide and snarky. . .

Jasben: Wow, you are a genius. Figuring out how to get an anti-American sentiment into a SciFi Wire article about Star Trek is impressive. I, as a dumb American, am in awe of your intellectual prowess.

So the captain is out,and the first officer has been comprimised - on a bridge full of officers - there's no one but a rank cadet on probation who could rise to captain the ship? What ever happened to the chain of command? Including everything that has been said, to me that is one big nit.

Can't really argue with that at all.

Darcseid,

I agree with j-dub. In fact I've already made plans to see the movie again this weekend! It truly is the best Trek ever. Bar none.

I could live with most of it as artistic license, it was a good flick. But the Cadet to Captain of the Flagship of Starfleet in one day requires me to be a complete moron if I don't go WTF!!

I'm pretty sure I missed half the rest of the movie while trying to figure out they can possibly expect THAT much suspension of disbelief!!

Darcseid,

I agree with j-dub. In fact I've already made plans to see the movie again this weekend! It truly is the best Trek ever. Bar none.

ok #12 Kirk promoted to Captain from Cadet and given a ship just because he was a hero? I doubt The Federation would turn a ship over to an inexperianced cadet.

That being said, I still loved the movie and will go see it again!!!!!!

This movie does not violate canon in the slightest.

It is stated plainly in the movie by both Uhura, Spock and um... Spock, that "we are now in an alternate timeline." One which obviously diverged from the moment George Kirk was killed, but made even more divergent by the destruction of Vulcan.
This universe is as valid as the Mirror Universe, which diverged when Zephram Cochrane decided to kill the 1st contact Vulcans rather than shake their hand...

Besides, This movie was vastly entertaining to watch, even more so than some of the Original series movies. And it contained as many internal Huh? moments as some of the others (Can anyone say Khan remembering Chekov? The Enterprise having 96 decks in TFF? The convenient forgetting that the Enterprise has shuttlecraft, leaving Sulu and others to freeze to death on a planet while Kirk's double wanders around because of broken transporters? Pulaski NEVER EVER used a transporter, so she is cursed to age exponentially? The Great Barrier suddenly blocking the middle of the galaxy instead of the edge...) Canon has ALWAYS taken a back seat to the needs of the plot. Trek in all it's incarnations has been very poor television/cinema. But, it has always been entertaining, despite its continuity/plot errors. Mostly in spite of them.
It is the philosophy of the Universe which Roddenberry spawned which has engendered such devotion among Trek fans, NOT the meaningless minutia of plot/character/ship details so many seemed determined to latch onto.
It is that devotion to minutia that has severely hampered any new productions. No one in their right (or left) minds would want to take up such a challenge, because no matter HOW close they got, the "devoted fans" would be doomsaying them for any deviation.
JJ has created an excellent continuation of the legacy, and I'm glad, because otherwise Trek would have deserved to die out, choked to death by the clinging grasp of its own fans.

As a side note, I LOVE how so many people are complaining that Abrams destroyed things because he couldn't even get details such as "Chekov not being on the Enterprise for the 1st two seasons."

Gee... Then second season episodes such as Who Mourns For Adonais, The Apple and the Trouble With Tribbles certainly have a few errors in them. A little tiny detail such as Walter Koenig portraying Pavel Chekov...

I forgot to add that I enjoyed the movie, very much.

Dugger, did you miss the part where time diverged into an alternate timeline the moment the Romulans destroyed the Kelvin???

If you can't handle that, I understand you disliking this movie and never watching the following movies because it will be based on this universe that JJ created.

But not sure why its hard to understand.. All the series incorporated Time Travel into the plots at times. Since your obviously a fan, then you seem to have accepted this, but your closing your mind to this? Remember, they had permission to do this from the Franchise, so its accepted.

Look on the bright side...maybe Voyager will never exist ;).

Look, it's a movie. Was it fun? Yes, Was it hard core Star Trek? Not really. I left feeling that it was fun and kind of Star Trek lite. The humor was a little over the top (in spots way over the top). The "alternate reality" actually has some interesting potential, what if Kirk goes to Talos IV? I agree the Spock/Uhura thing I didn't follow and the promotion from Cadet to Captain was just silly. But in the end, it was fun and that's what counts. Also one final point, folks might want to read Star Trek: Countdown, It explains how Nero's ship became so powerful (Hint: Thing Borg Technology....) Chris Pine was outstanding. I look forward to Star Trek 2 er 10 er well, you know what I mean.

I Freakin' Loved this movie! It rocked! And for some reason, I had a completely different WTF list (well, ALMOST completely...I still went WTF when kirk was handed the Enterprise at the end)

It was not perfect by any stretch, canon was shredded (though I appreciate the nod to us old diehards that while forgotten as it so often was, it's not gone), and logic, though frequently espouse gby a certain 'green blooded hobgoblin' was very much Hollywood logic, rather than that of the real world (and no- i am not talking about transported, warp drive, or inter-species reproduction).

Still, though it can be nitpicked to death (a trekker's favorite pastime) it entertained me greatly, and leave alot of potential for later stories. I do hope to see them.

Now I just came up with these off the top of my head in like 5 minutes...and if you think, you can do that with ANY Star Trek movie or tv episode. don't let that stop you from enjoying the stuff though, it's great fun!

ALERT!!! SPOILERS AHEAD!!! SOUND THE COLLISION ALARM!!! BRACE FOR IMPACT!!!

11)Where did Spock Prime get wood for a fire on a planet that was established with exterior as having NO VEGETATION?

10)Given the amount of time that the enterprise was travelling away from Vulcan before jettisoning Kirk, How could Vulcan possibly be see from Delta Vega?

9)Why in an era (prior to any timeline deviation) when Starfleet ships were much less advanced, and much more militaristic, was George Kirk's wife on board the Kelvin? (And if she was in starfleet too, aren't there regulations against fraternization in the 23rd C?)

8)If a single small drop of Red matter was enough to destroy Vulcan in a matter of minutes, How the heck did the Narada last so long?

7)If enough momentum was preserved in the beaming of Kirk and Sulu out of their freefall and onto the Enterprise that something smashed when they arrived, then how did they survive the impact with the transported bay floor? Wouldn't it have been simpler to leave out that particular audible detail?

6)I get why a fencer would bring along his high-tech unfolding sword when he's expecting to fight, but why would a random Romulan (former) miner have a high-tech unfolding battle-axe?

5)Why would thje federation build their outpost on Delta Vega (seemingly within sight of Vulcn) with buiding techniques (outward winging doors and crash-bar type latch mechanisms, brick or tile walls)? As someone who grew up in a town that got alot of snow, I can tell you that front door would have been snowed shut very quickly. If they were going to install advanced snow removal technology, why not just start with a more sensible design?

4)With obviously superhuman legs capable of leaping out of a car going over a cliff at high speed, why can't Kirk make the jump to the next platform on the Narada?

3)The Beastie Boys??? Sabotage????? (At the very least ist should have been 'Intergalactic'...)

2)Budweiser???? (I could have believed Guinness or even Sam Adams...)

1)If they 'jettison the core' of the enterprise's engines, how did they have enough power to keep going until the explosion that miraculously didn't destroy them could throw them clear of the singularity?

In response to Dugger:

“Put the damn camera in one place and film the action. I HATE cinematography where the camera is moving more than the action. Makes it very difficult to follow.”

It’s not the cinematography you have an issue with, it’s the editing. These days most of this technique is added in post production using computers. Fraking the camera footage has become quite popular to jazz up boring footage and add dramatic effect.

Point number 7 is irrelevant. Uhura translated that message before she argued Spock to assign her to the Enterprise remember. She probably reported it to her superior officer at her posting on earth, then it didn't matter to bring it up until Kirk pieced it together and confronted Pike.

[thebonafortuna], there is a countdown comic series that explains all your questions, but I agree with Thomas Mill(Author) that it should have been explained in the movie itself. The comic also has Picard as an ambassador, Worf a general in the Klingon Empire, a retired LaForge who created Spocks ship in the movie - its called the JellyFish and a reincarnated data (through B4 in ST: Nemesis) as captain of the Enterprise E. A cool read.

Nero is pissed because Spock promised to help save Romulus, but because of the Vulcan High Commands refusal to let their red matter technology fall into Romulan hands Spock was to late to save Romulus but was able to save the Federation afterward. The supernova was a weird event that would have engulfed the entire galaxy because of it unique properties.

Fantastic movie with obvious flaws, many trekkers are going to be pissed in what happens, but those who can understand that this is a re-imagining of the entire Star Trek universe (against cannon) purposely so may still love this one as I do.

This movie has a sense of fate between the original cast that even though everything is different they are still tied together. Now the door is open for a complete new era in the franchise to begin.

But the Kirk rise to captain from cadet in a day is the one aspect I can not explain. Though he was made first officer by Pike for those who over looked that.

Loved the apple eating in the Maru scene --- great callout to the apple in the genesis caves in Khan...

Movie was great ..it lived up to the hype everyone was good (bones was over the top). Great new take on old material. As for scifi.com writers you could have waited till next week to post this article with all the spoilers.. and check for facts snapper they weren't sent back 25 yrs in time it was more like 150-200 years they came from after the next generation era. They waited 25 years in the present to let JT Kirk grow up and stop them....no really they had to wait 25 years from the time they arrived to the time Old Spock arrived to get the red matter(You did watch the movie before you wrote the article right) so they couls use the red matter to destroy planets. And vulcans/romulans live twice as long as humans which is why nero did'nt age after 25 years in the present.

a lot has been said about the much too coincidental nature of the plot. True being thrown off the ship and landing on the planet where Spock and Scotty just happen to be is a major coincidence but really is it any more so than....
Kirk finding the Botany Bay
Kirk meeting the long lost and presumed dead Zephran Cochran
Kirk finding a long lost space probe turned intelligent...
twice
Bones meeting his old girlfriend who happens to be a monster
The Enterprise coming across a planet size space ship that happens to carry the cure for McCoy's incurable disease....
need I go on?
It's Star Trek
"Coincidence and farfetched plots is our business..It’s why we watch her

I'm surprised that no one has mentioned the "you cannot break the laws of physics" wtf. What's with the visible black holes that appear to evaporate once they've served thier purpose?

I was very entertained by the film, clown hands and all...but come on.

This is all needless nitpicky stuff. A really entertaining movie will gladly take liberties with logic for a better ride, and it should. Because... it's a movie.

The movie was great, dont let SciFi Wire discourage you from seeing this movie. Most of their complaints are completely unfounded. Please, if you want to see this movie, go, dont worry about what these people are saying and just go, you will enjoy it very much.

SCI FI Wire: Cool!

They should have let him nail the hot Orion chick (now DEAD hot Orion chick) on screen.

Are you serious? Did you really need Kirk's clown hands? Damn right you did, that whole disease scene was epic beyond belief.

And the mining ship deal, I can't let that slide either. Mining ships are geared to the teeth. No doubt Nero did a little refitting in the future as well...was that so hard? And does it really matter what they were mining?

The rest...yeah, I'll admit were oddities but "wtf?!" moments? Not even close. Better luck next time.

They dump suspected criminals on deserted planets?! Trek has REALLY lost it's way. This is almost as bad if not worse than Enterprise.

Kirks clown hands and so many other things are just wrong with this movie that I dont want to even get into it..ITs really a mockery of what star trek is supposed to be. The whole make out scene between spock and uhura on the transporter was by far the worse part of the movie. Are we trying to add a little twilight to the Star Trek universe here?? cmon! I was expecting abrams to take his duty seriously but obviously he went the slapstick route its really too sad. The whole time I was watching the movie all i could think was how much better all its predecessors were. Its really too bad since I really wanted to like this movie.

If you read STAR TREK: COUNTDOWN, the prequel graphic novel, you'll find out that even though Nero's is a Romulan mining vessel, it is actually outfitted with BORG technology, giving it superior fire power as well as cloaking and sensor capabilities. It is also adaptive. The AI examines potential threats and fixes them by modifying the ships systems.

This was provided by 'The Vault'. An advanced military facility only known by Romulan High Command. Nero's ship was picked up by them after he had rescued the Ruling Council.

So this should take care of # 8 and 9.

The rest didn't seem to stand out as "WTF" moments.

I think we can safely call this "Star Trek Lite".

Man, all these posts! Mine'll never get read. Anyway, I haven't seen it yet, but I've seen the clip (How did you beam aboard...? and all that). My question is, what's with the lights? I could hardly SEE the clip with all the background lights glaring and shining into the camera. Is the whole movie like that? Or at least all the Enterprise scenes? The Enterprise seemed very dark in Generations-Nemesis. Is someone trying to overcompensate for that?

It didn't have any more plot holes and WTFs than any of the other Star Trek movies did (especially those original series ones). My only real issue was the whole changing of Trek history thing that the writers decided to do. But, at the same time, I can't help but respect the balls that it took for Abrams and the writers to risk a major backlash from fans by deciding to go their own way with the story.

Also, as a fan of Star Trek Enterprise, I REALLY appreciated the subtle nod to that series: Scotty referring to a transporter incident that involved "Admiral Archer's prize beagle." That show was by far my favorite of the five shows, and I'm glad Abrams and company thought it was worth acknowledging.

Addendum--

A Consumer Warning On The New Star Trek. Don't Waste You Ticket Money On This One. You Have Been Warned!!!:

I am glad to see that Sci-Fi Wire has outed this movie. In your last chat room about the new Star Trek film, I was roundly attacked by those who were posting, people in large part, whom I suspect were "studio plants".

The new Star Trek lacks vision...and or, a reason for being, in the first place, as it has no real perspective on life in regard to saying anything of any real import to the audience, or about its characters? I just saw Happy Feet for the first time tonight...essentually it is the story of Jonathan Livingston Seagull, but reworked and featuring Penguins in place of Seagulls...and boy, does that film have a perspective on life???!!! It is about following your own path....and daring to think outside the box. As well, it is about living in a way that respects the enviroment, one that places us in harmony with each other, and the rest of the world, for the ultimate good of all. Although the new Star Trek film eludes to finding one's path in life, several times, in respect to the mythic hero's journey, as popularized by author Joseph Campbell, that theme in the plotline...suddenly stops, and any such forward progress toward that end, ceases once Kirk boards the Enterprise??? The film then quickly becomes a series of explosions, amid a muddled plot, one featuring a ridiculous villain and his equally ridiculous crew...all leading to a disappointing rehash of a climax, one that we have all seen in dozens of post Star Wars films...complete with a Star Wars: A New Hope like celebration at the end, for the conquering young hero? In this movie, Kirk doesn't so much as earn his destiny, he stumbles into it, as an accidental hero, not a true one, unlike, say, Luke Skywalker. This, yet another blaring fault in the writing and direction of this film???

The scenes featuring Leonard Nimoy were a disappointing embarrassment...every last one of them, for the most part, and that has truly shaken my confidence in Hollywood and its ability, or should I say, inability to maintain and nurture its most beloved tv and film franchises, properly. What happened to quality control?

Even more troubling for the film, is the fact that it ends with a damaged timeline...and since time travel is not alien to the Star Trek universe, from the original tv series, to the latter day sequel series, and finally to the movie franchise, featuring the original cast, to the new casts, it makes zero sense that our heroes found it impossible to repair the timeline. All they need do is stop future Spock from creating the black hole device, or kill Nero before he could kill Kirk's father, and or, kill Nero before he could destroy the planet Vulcan, or capture him in his future timeline, or in the past, before he could act on his warped plan? Or hey, how about saving the Romulans in the future? Instead, we heard no such talk, and saw no such action, and that is just poor writing--and at its very worst??? And then there are all the coincidences that appear everywhere in this movie--painful coincidences that begin to get very annoying when Kirk is stranded on a planet by young Spock...where he just happens to run into an ice cave that older Spock just happens to be hanging-out in, having been stranded by Nero, although there is a Star Fleet outpost nearby within a short walking distance...where young Scotty just happens to be in charge??? This is just silly folks, as well as incompetent, and lazy, writing wise--all amounting to a bad film, and not in a slang word fueled..."good way!!!"

If you want to see a really good, to great, science fiction film, I recommend Silent Running, or Serenity, or even Dark City (the film that the Matrix ripped-off)...and if you wish to see a great Trek film, see Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan...or Star Trek: Voyage Home, as this new Trek film is just not what it is advertised as being.

It cost me 10 dollars to buy a ticket for this film, and I feel like a mugging victim right now? Paramount stole my money...and I want it back!!! Take this as a sincere consumer warning, the press is largely not telling the truth about this film, they are raving about it, but in terms of packing a punch and transporting us into a story of substance that makes us think and feel, and gives us something to relate to in our lives, this isn't it? Happy Feet, a family film, although several years old now, surprisingly tap dances upon this movie...with respect to informing us about what really makes the soul sing and move--it is a classic movie! I felt joyous as I watched that film tonight, but Star Trek played dead as you would expect a rehash of science fiction and fantasy cliches would. There were very few laughs and very few reasons to cheer, if any...and curiously, the film dragged repeatedly; it was a painfully slow experience? I grew-up as a fan of Trek, so I respect it, at least, when it is good, or great, but I will not defend what is bad about it, the same with Star Wars--that which is great, is beautiful, and that which is bad is beyond disappointing, and is utterly embarrassing, and such is the case with the new Trek. It is not so much embarrassing, save for the scenes featuring Nimoy, but it is just very, very disappointing...and it is simply awful to see my childhood memories traded on, sold-out...and turned into a pre-packaged MTV meets Beverly Hills 90210, Gossip Girl, The Hills, and American Idol? It is just plain disheartening...and to see that there are many who would just accept it and cheer it on...it just shows how our new junk food throw away society has rotted the brains of the new generations out, people who happily mistaken trash for treasure!!! Very sad indeed.

Mugging victim? Nobody gets mugged for 10 bucks you jackass...besides if you're that bent about 10 bucks, you definitely have bigger problems than the new Trek move. Very sad is right.

Uber Critic:

It's clear that you haven't watched the same movie as the rest of us. Fortunately, you are in the EXTREME minority, and for that I am glad.

Do the rest of us a favor and don't watch!!

Wm De Bracy :

No, I haven't seen the same movies as you, "the plants" have...but then again you are being paid to claim that you like it,but I am just telling the God's honest truth to whoever wants to hear it. This is just a horrible movie!!!

To: Really?

Actually, people do get mugged for whatever money they have, it happens allthe time, Mr. or Ms. Niave, but it certainly happened to me when I got mugged for my 10 bucks by Paramount.

So since we have different opinions from you Uber Critic, we are studio plants? So everyone in the theater who saw the movie with you, none of them liked it or are you saying the ones in your group that liked it worked for the studio???

Maybe your William Shatner?? Mad over the fact you weren't in the movie....

I for one thoroughly enjoyed it. The acting spot on. th eeffects sp[ot on. the plot spot on. Don't know why you lot are so stupid to think that JJ was going to bring a traditional Trek movie out. The franchise needed a change. This plotline has done that technically wiping Treklore clean to start again. GET OVER IT!!!! If everything in the Trekworld was following a Trektimeline then the movie would have been boring.

I liked this movie, but if they had hired someone to ask questions about things like the above and more, it would have been awesome. They probably wouldn't have even had to pay anyone...they could get people to volunteer for it (beer, soft drinks and pizza optional). People would kiss JJ's feet to be able to do that....seriously, I don't understand why they don't have someone who can pick through the major plotholes....wouldn't cost them a penny and they'd have a much better film.

Uber Critic,

I'm not sure how things are in your part of the woods, but in my part we ask for our money back if we think a flick is as big a stinker as you believe.

Also with a little research, you would have discovered Abrams old-schooled it and built this movie on and with 35mm film stock (2.35:1 anamorphic lens). You didn't have to go to a state of the art theater to see this movie in its "ideal" form. You could have saved some bucks.

At first I was elated that my suspicions this Enterprise was transwarp was wrong. Then at the end of Nero's defeat the E started spitting out warp cores like a Pez dispenser and that was my: WTF?

To: Son of a Maui Portagee

You are from Maui? That is quite lovely to hear! I am sure you have a beautiful people. I am from the U.S., and it is not so great--believe me, it is overhyped.

On to the new Star Trek. I just heard that Paramount spent 130 to 150 million dollars on the film? I just wonder where all the money went, as I didn't see it on screen? A much better film dramatically speaking, is Serenity. Joss Whedon did a great job with his film Serenity, spending only 37 million dollars on the film...and although an extra 20 or 30 million dollars would have really helped the film's look in a few scenes, the movie really blows away the new Trek film in terms of overall quality from Whedon's personally authored script, to his direction of the film. In a straight-up contest between the two films, Serenity wins over this disappointing Trek movie, like David who slew Goliath.

Dreugan:

The theater was largely silent in which I saw this film in. I will tell you the truth, though here in this town, that happens a lot, but I have seen louder receptions to other films, like the film Obsessed, for instance. the reception for that film was very much like a cheap Cinemax soft porn movie, but it had some very effective lines of dialogue and action that charged the audience...moving them to clap and cheer. Yes the film was a cheap rip-off of Fatale Attraction, but it managed to get to the audience effectively, to my surprise?

To a lesser extent, Wolverine drew some laughs and cheers, but the new Star Trek just largely laid there, and the audience stared on, unmoved for the most part. But never mind that--I could careless about their opinions, yeah or nay, I always act as a independent thinker and I am never influenced by an audience. I hated Obsessed, BTW, and I disliked Wolverine even more, but, I must say, both films felt more satisfying that the similarly manufactured paint by numbers film...Star Trek...a film that is mostly a rip-off of Harve Bennett's Star Trek: Star Fleet Academy script. Search the net for details on it...as it would have made a much better Trek movie than the one we have been served.

lol...so true! The monsters...WTF!? I was like: omg, is that the snow monster, wow, how could that ever be beaten in uselessness!? Ah, well, with an even bigger monster!

But I love the film! Still thinking if it's almost perfect or just about to be almost perfect ;)

xoxo

Addendum, For Typos--

Dreugan:

The theater was largely silent in which I saw this film in. I will tell you the truth though, here in this town, that happens a lot, but I have seen louder receptions to other films, like the film...Obsessed, for instance. The reception for that film was very much like a cheap Cinemax soft porn movie, but it had some very effective lines of dialogue and action that charged the audience--moving them to clap and cheer. Yes, the film was a cheap rip-off of Fatal Attraction, but it managed to get to the audience, effectively, to my surprise?

To a lesser extent, Wolverine drew some laughs and cheers, but the new Star Trek just largely laid there, and the audience stared on, unmoved, for the most part. But never mind that--I could careless about their opinions, yay, or nay, I always act as a independent thinker and I am never influenced by an audience. I hated Obsessed, BTW, and I disliked Wolverine even more, but, I must say, both films felt more satisfying that the similarly manufactured paint by numbers film...Star Trek, a film that is mostly a rip-off of Harve Bennett's Star Trek: Star Fleet Academy script. Search the net for details on it...as it would have made a much better Trek movie than the one we have been served.

"Uber Critic" -- you're a twerp. More specifically, a paranoid twerp. So do you think that Paramount is stalking you or something?

My guess is that you went in determined to hate this film, and spent your time looking for things that would confirm your pre-built opinion. The giveaway is your comment about all the other Trek movies being so much better than this -- really? THE FINAL FRONTIER? INSURRECTION? NEMESIS? I could make WTF? lists on those three that would climb into triple digits.

Truth is, I didn't trust JJ Abrams to turn in a decent movie -- god knows MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE 3 was a steaming pile of shit, and ALIAS bored me to tears. I was expecting a poor movie, one with a suckalicious underscore from Michael Giacchino.

To my shock, it turns out this is actually a pretty good movie, with some issues here and there. I have no problem with the alternate timeline business...it's just another parallel in the Star Trek multiverse, and some things have happened differently, and the ripples are running along the timeline. As ways of rebooting go, this one's marginally clever -- because it means STAR TREK is actually a direct sequel to the previous ten, but leads to new places, not The Original Series and Star Trek: The Motion Picture.

Yeah, Kirk going from cadet to Captain in a flash is a stretch and a half (just like Pike going from Captain to Admiral in the same span), but they did establish in the course of the film -- flying by -- that they had crewing issues, making the Enterprise a cadet boat right out of spacedock. They also established that Starfleet got its ass seriously kicked. Even so...I'd think they'd want Kirk to get the sort of tactical, operational and command training a Captain needs.

I haven't got an issue with the Uhura/Spock thing. There's actually hints of that in the original series.

I like the way this is going. And if I feel like I need to have Star Trek that goes the way it used to go, well...I have all those episodes and movies at hand. JJ Abrams didn't affect any single one of them.

(And just in closing...who really trashed Trek? The studio, in all kinds of ways. Rick Berman can take a few knocks too, but, really, the studio dunnit.)

damn, its like the dr who reboot all over again.. im VERY unsure if im going to like this film or not. Someone tell me its not cheesey with loads of CGI like the Dr who reboot was... I just want a decent story thats all, im not a canon-freak or anything. I just dont like cheesey sci-fi....oh and also just like RTD, I find JJ Abrams stuff is very Hit and miss for me! I either like it or not... ill give it a chance anyway...

also,, reading this thread in general is really funny , I love how people are insulting each other other - its like the sci-fi equivilent of Youtube!
Some of you should learn that if you have to insult someone else to get your point across then you need to take a look at yourself.

Seen the movie last night better than t]The Next Generation movies.Would like to see a movie made
from the Enterprise series with the same cast showing the Romulan Wars

Sci fi is barking up the wrong tree,this was the best Star Trek.There is no need to try to bash it.also if you pay attention th the movie everything made sense.

Uber Critic, I tried to respond to you on the last thread, but the CAPTCHA was indecipherable every time.

I just don't get how you can be so hard on the movie. Did JJ kill your dog?

I'm an Australian (feel free to publish my IP, sci fi), with no affiliation to Paramount, or any of the other movie studios or their agents (and you can extend that as far and wide as you want, I'm not using weasel words here) - and it was a stonking fantastic movie. The best Star Trek movie, bar none, imho.

The Spock coincidence was a bit strange, but I didn't even notice it at the time, I was just enjoying it.

The 3 non-Trek people I saw it with also loved it. And the casual trekkie dug it too.

I was actually annoyed that they needed to explain that the timeline was different from the Kirk scene on - that was so bleeding obvious, I thought talking about it was a waste of time!

But Kirk's "aptitude tests were off the charts" according to Pike; he was made First Officer by Pike (who clearly had a man-crush on the kid), and it looked like he'd have graduated with honours had the Kobayashi test not gone down differently from the first timeline (was there a court martial before? That surprised (and delighted) me).

I don't care that the movie did away with stuff, and rewrote time from Kirk's birth on out. It had the Star Trek "vibe". The series was dead. Paramount killed it. And now, we've got a new, strange lease on life, and it's fantastic.

But... as I saw in an interview with JJ - jeopardy is back. Spock might not die next time around, but any of the characters could die and stay dead.

And I *loved* that there was no reset. That was brave, and that was a good thing, even if it annoys the paranoid fans that can't deal with a little bit of canonical ambiguity (except on their own terms).

What did poop me was the Pike/Kirk bar scene, with the digital zoom "flicking" that the camera was doing, like a robotic version of NYPD Blue. Oh, and FFS, got enough lens flare? Does JJ charge an appearance fee per lens flare? :)

Loved it, 8/10

Why does Shinzon... sorry Nero, need to drill to a planet's core before using the "red matter" (that's an inventive name!)? If it creates a black hole it will be more than powerful enough to suck a planet in without being at the planet's core. Nero clearly studied at the Dr. Evil school of villainy.

Furthermore, why did they steal Spock's future ship from Nero's ship? Why not just set the self-destruct and let it create a black hole on Nero's ship?

You can tell this film was written by the same idiots who wrote Bayformers.

I'll admit to having a love/hate relationship with Star Trek. I always rush to see the films and have watched each new series when they are air. But inevitably I'm disappointed. This one no different. It was a rollicking frenetic adventure but the plot seemed to move forward with one coincidence piled on another. The whole Delta Vega act a case in point.

1. Kirk is chased across the ice plain into the one ice cave occupied by Spock!
2. Spock has a flaming torch! I'm with the previous WTF, where did he find the vegetable matter to construct the torch?
3. The Ice Cave is within 15 Kms of a Star Fleet observation post. Which Kirk and Spock proceed to walk towards. Which raises a number of other points:
a. What happened to the monster that chased Kirk into the cave?
b. If that monster had wandered off, there were no other animals to interfere with their walk to the base?
c. Knowing the base was there why hadn't Spock already made the effort to walk to it to raise the alarm?
d. Why hadn't Nero destroyed the base to ensure Spock could neither survive nor raise an alarm?
4. Having got to the Station, the station seemed entirely oblivious to the fact that a planet, that they either orbited, or was a sister world, with over 6 billion inhabitants had just been destroyed?! There was no indication of frantic activity to warn Earth or any sense of loss. Scotty was just lounging about chilling out.
5. I don't know enough about the effect of a world's destruction by a black hole but wouldn't there be some effect on Delta Vega? You know, like gravity waves creating earthquakes or at least being bombarded by some debris, or energy released by the consuming of Vulcan by the black hole? ('m guessing that the mass of the black hole would not be sufficient to alter the relationship between the orbits of Delta Vega and the space where Vulcan was.)

After the Delta Vega act I just switched off my higher brain functions and just went along for the ride ...

Wow, Uber Critic, paranoid much? Over a Star Trek movie... :S

I really enjoyed myself. The rest of the audience really enjoyed themselves. There was even a round of applause at the end; something that just does not happen in the UK.

My only real issue was the lens flare and the shaky hand cam. Whedon used these to perfection in Firefly and Serenity. Abrams clearly went "wow, those are cool... lets use them LOADS!" My eyes were aching by the midway point. Hopefully the effect is lessened on a smaller screen because I will be getting the DVD.

But that was it. I've never been much of Trek nitpicker... and when I do I seem to pick at nits that no one else noticed while the rest pass by me. If I were to hate every Trek movie and episode that I 'wtf' moments, I'd never bother watching Trek again.

What's that quote from the beginning of The Star Trek Nitpicker's Guide... "The only consistency in Star Trek is its inconsistencies."

Gotta say I was worried about Karl Urban being chosen to play McCoy; the only thing I've seen him in is Xena, as Caesar (and apparently he's in LotR... neh). He was excellent though, better than Quinto as Spock. The very first scene with Quinto my mind just kept leaping back to Sylar, but that soon dissipated. He did a great job. Pegg as Scotty was pure comedy gold... perhaps a little too much comic relief for some, but I've always seen Scotty that way. *waits for an ear bashing*

So, my three favourite characters worked out just dandy. Whatever else they did 'wrong' they got my top three right, so they're good by me.

It's a great movie. Go in expecting a fun ride, and a bit of a lark... think Trials and Tribbleations levels of humour and remember; it's an alternate time line. It's spelled out, in small words on three separate occasions. It was so obvious to me that these three moments were thrown in to drive home the fact that this is a whole new world. The lines jarred horribly with the rest of the script, with the scenes... they just screamed "we're saying this so you people understand what we've done to the time lines" Clearly some people still managed to miss them.

I agree; there is more to dislike about this movie than to like. This is not a prequel. It's Star Trek tabula rasa. It merely uses the Star Trek brand name to launch a look-a-like. The science is pretty bad. There are too many coincidences. The whole mood is not Star Trek (Spock blows the villain to bits out of revenge while he has the chance to save him ? That's a different character altogether. Anyway : why open fire on a disabled ship that's about to be destroyed in a second anyway . Nimoy looks out of place.
I was never bored, but neither was I swept away by this film. I left feeling a bit let down. I am not ready for Star Trek 2.

Abrams always said, that star trek musst be rebootet, because 40 years of complex history make it impossible to write good storries.

I say ... dear JJ, maybe you could not do that, but for example I, can it for sure.

Even nobody would ever say, that we have to rewrite our worlds history, because is impossible to make good historical movies, bevause there are so many historical facts to consider. Komplet nonsen.

When Abrams and co. can`t du it, than they should make place for someone who can!

Star Trek XI is a good movie, but it is no Star Trek movie. I better call it "Trek Wars Troopers I"

Bongo:

The movie is sloppy, from start to finish. If they wanted to reboot everything, then dare to kill someone central to the proceedings...but they didn't? They were scared to kill young Kirk, or Spock, or McCoy? No real jeapardy, no guts, and no real glory? This same problem came about in the Star Wars prequels. How can you fear for Kenobi, Yoda, the robots, or Anakin, when you already knew that they would survive? Lucas should have killed off Kenobi and replaced him with a clone...to shake-up the audience, or blown up the Millenium Falcon and replaced it with a rebuilt version, etc. That would have made the audience sit-up and pay attention, and kept them unsure as to who would live, or die. Or why not kill Padme and reveal that Luke and Leia's mother would actually be another woman...not the woman, Padme, as we had priorly assumed? As you suggest, you need real jeapardy for your heroes in order to keep audiences on the edge of their seats, and as you can see, I agree fully. In Serenity, Joss Whedon had the guts to kill off central crew members and threaten others, but the Star Wars prequels fled from that opportunity, as did the new Trek film?

Speaking of the new Trek, this timeline alteration is just a cheap gimmick by Paramount, nothing more, and that is the way it plays...as the cheap trick that it is because of JJ Abrams and Paramount failing to take the risk and spill blood...save for side characters?

As for Kirk's aptitude test, that means nothing unless you can use it in the field, in real battle. They already knew that he cheated during the Kobayashi test, why not with the others, including the aptitude test? He, Kirk, needed to be tested in battle, and you just don't give out a first officer post to a guy who hasn't fully proven himself worthy, and that is the reason why I mentioned the Officer And A Gentlemen training sequences. If this movie had given us something similar to that, to show us that Kirk works well in a command structure, and can think and do, as well as improvise, even without cheating...and pull things off brilliantly,well, in that event, I could have bought him getting that first officer post, but Abrams was just too lazy to do it, instead we got endless scenes of Nero standing around sulking...and yelling? I would have liked to see how Star Fleet trains its cadets. i would have loved to see them learn how to parachute, do space walks, beam from ship to ship, or to planets, or moons. I would have liked to have seen their drill insructors hammering them into shape, or flunking them out of the academy...or even seen some students die while training, to show us how dangerous this training is, and that accidents do happen. But no, they jumped 3 years past that, to the conflict??? Lazy, lazy, and triple lazy. As for Leonard Nimoy, frankly, he got in the way of the film--he didn't improve it, he hurt it. His scenes were the worst in the film...and appeared to be forced and rushed, and I am a longtime Star Trek fan saying this.

That said, if you liked it, you are welcomed to it, I mean no spite in saying that, but it just seems to me that the filmmakers, with a 130 to 150 million budget, would have, and should have, taken more care to avoid most of the blaring mistakes that they did make--especially the timeline issues. Rent Star Gate: Continuum on DVD. They dealt with this timeline paradox issue beautifully, and really trumped the new Star Trek movie by doing what good filmmakers should do, and that is to take the time to get their work right. The makers of the new Star Trek film had a 130 to 150 million dollar budget, and they forgot to invest in a good script? What were these people smoking???

It never ceases to amaze me how much more highly evolved I am am than most people who post on this site (and I don't mean that as a pretentious statement). The simple fact of the matter is that EVERY single person on this planet has a different taste in movies, books, or whatever than everyone else. This taste is UNIQUE to them and them only. For any one person to assume that they know better or that their tastes should define everyone else's tastes is (to me) the epitome of arrogance. Everyone is entitled to watch whatever they want and formulate whatever opinions they want.. WHY CAN'T YOU SO-CALLED "DIE-HARD" STAR TREK FANS ACCEPT THAT!?

I loved this movie for as many reasons as I hated it, but it is NO DIFFERENT than any of the other Star Trek movies before in the errors it made along the way. It dared to go places that the Star Treks before it didn't go. And, as a movie by itself, it was really frakking good. Of course it wasn't PERFECT, but NO movie can ever claim to be that. As a new movie and a reinvention of the franchise this movie succeeded, and I can't wait to see what future sequels might hold within their complex and convoluted stories.

So please, all you die hards that bow down at the alter of Shatner every day, PLEASE shut the frak up and let the rest of us enjoy this. I have been one of JJ Abrams' harshest critics these last few years, but he has accomplished something with this film that few before him have. Please stop being so frakking petty and let the man enjoy this for one weekend at least.

I loved the movie and I agree with all the accounts.

However, I still despise Abrams annoying, spit-in-your-face arrogance with which he has advertised the movie. He basically used the Star Trek fans' anger against him to propel himself into a kind of olympus, telling the world: "I can even do a great movie about something I despise and kiss my buttocks for it." And that is not the way to treat fans.

No doubt about it, it is a great movie. But this is not Abram's doing, this is the screenwriter's doing and they do deserve all the credits.

I would only love to see the "in-between-movie" that they have written as a comic, it would be a nice way to say goodbye to TNG.

Agreed on all points, But I still loved the movie.

A playwright -- whose name escapes me -- said something interesting once on the subject of believability. He said that it's not your job as a writer to make your audience believe what's going on -- you're telling them what's happening, so why shouldn't they believe it?

If they don't, it's because they've chosen not to... and there's nothing you can do for them.

The best way to describe this Star Trek is just to say its received the Indiana Jones treatment. With Indiana Jones you know your going to watch a movie thats suspends all logic and you just are supposed to go along for the ride and enjoy the crazy coincidences and oddball laughs..this being in stark contrast to all previous star trek films that for the most part take themselves pretty seriously. So yeah i hope this helps anyone who is on the fence about seeing the movie..notice I left out my own opinion about whether its a good or bad movie. I just want people to know what theyre getting into because the trailers certainly dont allude to the fact that this movies overall feel can be rather campy at times.

There is just something about Star Trek in what ever form that is familiar, comfortable and exciting all at the same time. Sitting in the move theater was like waiting for the arrival of an old friend. I can overlook the WTF's cause that’s what you do with friends. People around me were cheering and actually interacting with the movie. The lady sitting next to me talked to me!!! off and on during the movie. When do strangers now a days do that. Well they do in the Star Trek world. Some how I missed the promo of Leonard Nemoy being in the film. Was kinda sad to see how old he is. Sort of speaks to our own mortality. So Yea! For some new blood taking over to give us more Star Trek adventures. I’m ready for MORE going where no one has gone before!!! aren’t you?
P.S even in the original TV series there were hysterical comedic moments....the clown hands were just loads of fun.

OK, this is Star Trek movie... and is not.
I could accept different reality which was started in this movie, but 2 things nag me seriously:

1. Beginning of different reality - would captain (or AI) on almost untouched Borg-enhanced Romulan ship allow almost destroyed and seriously disabled Federation ship to ram in it? This brings serious hate/intelligence suspicions about Romulans in me... I'd hack that Federation starship in pieces! And then pursue pods...
After this scene, I forgot classic ST and started to look it as ordinary action SF movie...

2. Is Starfleet really so stupid to crew flagship with only cadets in essential posts? Where is experienced crew? I can accept 17 yr old navigator on training, but not on combat mission. However, this point is nicely solved for Bones, by death of more expirienced crew/officers.

Other point nags me badly... we have seen Enterprise (or at least Constitution class ship) built on Earth... and everywhere else (at least in classic ST) is stated that this class of ship couldn't EVER land on planet... or launch from it! So how did it get up in space? Canon (or "standard") ST claims following: Launched in 2245, the original and illustrious starship U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701 was built in the San Francisco Yards orbiting Earth. ST Wiki offers variant: According to The Making of Star Trek, the Enterprise was built on Earth but assembled in space.
Maybe I have just imagined seeing hull and nacelles being built on Earth? No, I did not... it's even in trailer.
I accept timeline can change... but gravity change not!

However, movie was fun - despite heavy illogical or accidental series of events. As other posters stated, that's ST... ;)

JJ did all right but for the love of Star Trek just consult a half dozen trekkies before writing a storyline. The dialogue was great and is what this crew should be patting themselves on the back for. I would say for the next go around let true trekkies build the story and set pieces and then let JJ come in and infuse his dialogue and style into it. They did it backwards.

Squeeeeeee! I loved this movie so much!
So many sexy scenes, I love some good ol romance in space!
For a 75 year old dude like me this is heaven!

The worst Trek movie? A tie: Insurrection, Nemesis, Final Frontier with Generations barely losing out.

There are some major problems with logic in this film.

1) It really doesn't make any sense for Nero not to first destroy the star that would nova and kill his planet.

2) Why does Earth have no defense network? Seriously, why is it that only future Spock's ship is the only ship on the planet that can take out the drill? (This is the same question for the planet Vulcan).

(Look at the U.S. On 9/11, jets scrambled around every major city. Are we to believe that there were no military ships anywhere else on the whole planet accept Spock's to fire on the drill? Zounds!)

3) Delta Vega is within distance of Vulcan. If the Vulcan disappeared into a black hole, the resulting loss of mass in the Vulcan star system would have had an effect on Delta Vega. Read up on celestial mechanics.

4) Kirk was a tool. The movie's real hero was Spock. There was nothing great about Kirk. All that supposed to be great about Kirk we are told: 1) He's smart. 2) His dad was a hero. 3) Kirk can fill out his tight undies. Whatever. I just didn't like Kirk.

This isn't the fault of Chris Pine. It's just that the script didn't serve Pine well in terms of fleshing out the character. The movies should have been 30 minutes longer to build on the character and add more detail (like how a Romulan mining ship became a heavily armed war vessel!!).

What does Kirk really do that earns him his captaincy? Nothing that's all that great.

It was a 2-and-half-star film (that's being generous). I left wanting to know more about Spock and Uhura, not Kirk, who just seemed like another cocky frat boy instead of a dynamic hero.

Finally, why are people hitting each other over the head because their disagreements about the film. It's just a movie. People should be able to express their approval or disapproval without personal attacks.

First off, loved the move, and I'm a long time Trek fan. However, my biggest wtf: are you telling me there wasn't a single Vulcan or Federation ship left that could take out the drill and therefore stop the destruction of the planet? It couldn't have been very well protected if Kirk and Sulu could take it out with small arms fire. Ground trrops with RPGs could have done it!

After watching this movie, I feel like Spock, and the Vulcans...

Fans, we truly are boldly going where none of us has gone before, and I'm scared but at least we still have each other.

There is a lot of questions about promoting Kirk to 1st officer by Cpt. Pike just before the trek to Nero's ship. I think this was like Pike's challenge to Kirk because he knows that despite Kirk being right about the Romulan ship he knows how improbable it is that they will survive. Although he promotes him he also sends him on a suicide mission immediately afterward which still leaves the Enterprise in very capable hands with Spock. It's like Pike was saying, If you survive this mission and save the Enterprise then you deserve to be 1st officer.

I'm a long time trekker. I routinely watch whatever series is on, the movies or anything else Trek. I went in excited but already with a dislike for JJ Abrams since I hate his other works. I had a pre-conceived view that he was throwing away 30 years of beloved familiar territory for a dumbed down MTV flick.

I loved the movie. It was exciting. I haven' t felt like that since wrath of khan. Yes, canon was thrown out. If you sit and nit pick all the tiny details you'll find that they don't jell...but who went to see this for a dissertation? I went to enjoy it. I'm excited that the familiar Star Trek Universe I've always known will be continued in a way that I'm not going to automatically "Know" what should happen.

If you are going to just find every little item that you can to pick on, you should really have a look at all the old episodes and movies. You can find the same thing with them.

My opinion is that this movie gives excitement back to the franchise.

The Star Trek franchise has produced an amazing number of television episodes, movies, and books. And somewhere in a dimly lit warehouse reminiscent of Area 51 sit the choniclers that have to keep track of every aspect of the Star Trek universe and make sure that the new stories fit. This movie was genius. Almost everything we know about the Star Trek universe is now gone. Almost because the Enterprise series takes place prior to this. So the Borg are still coming and Vger should still be out there. And we have a Spock who can help the story along by warning them of things that still exist.

One of the issues in revisiting the original Trek was the design of the ship and bridge. But with the destruction of the Kelvin and members of her crew they can play off the designs as "this is how they came about now."

The biggest WTF is Kirk being in command during the show and at the end. It can be presumed that Pike felt strongly enough about what he saw in him that he stretched or even broke regulations, but let's face it, do we really want a series of movies where we follow young Kirk through the ranks until he gets to be a captain? Do we want it to be all about Kirk? Do we want this actor to have his head swell more than Kirk's hands did? Do we want this actor to be known as nothing more than a Priceline negotiator at some point in his career?

This was a set-up movie, and it did a much better job than, say, the first Fantastic Four movie. Now we have a ship, and a crew, that are basically familiar to us, but that can explore strange new worlds, a whole new universe, without having to worry about violating the edicts of the chroniclers in the warehouse. And they can finally go outside and play.

All it takes to transport people into a moving ship at warp is a new formula! Heh.

This was the most unoriginal movie I've ever seen, and for Trek thats bad, but overall it came out good.

This movie wasn't too bad, as I think most people liked it. It had alot of trek morsels & good themes like friendship, teamwork, and "It'll work" which fits the energy of the movie better and is more positive than reusing something cliche like "don't give up." Both incarnations of spock pretty much saved the movie, although the beginning could have been edited to start with the Kobyashi Maru test & his dad dying. Sulu rocked that sword. If this is what it takes to make better STs in the future, its fine. My expectations for the next movie are going to be alot higher on every level though, and I don't mean more SFX & violence. Kinda stupid in parts, had reediming qualities, but not bad. I would recommend seeing it.

Snowkestrel is right Guinness would have been
BRILLIANT!

In general, I loved the movie but there are things that could've/should've been different...

Archer and his dog were mentioned as if they could possibly still be alive in this time. Even in the Star Trek universe, this is highly unlikely.

Why in the hell would an Orion woman be a member of Starfleet. By their nature, they are highly untrustworthy.

They could've made Chekhov sound at least a little Russian for real instead of giving him that horrible accent the original had.

Winona Ryder's makeup was terrible. It didn't make her look old. It just made her look like she had bad skin.

anybody cared to mention the NEW super speed for "warp drive"???? damn!! they got from -let's say... Earth- to Vulcan in what?... 10 minutes???? a little time frame would be very much appreciated...

SECOND AND WORST OF ALL -imho-
how come SPOCK devises a plan to save Romulus creating a black hole in the -soon to be- supernova??? wtf was he thinking -or the writers to be the case-... did he think the black hole would just dissapear leaving the supernova in its previous state: a simple Romulan system Sun....
man... anybody can guess the freakking b.h. will EAT Romulus sooner than later...

Peace, prosperity AND BETTER SCRIPTS!!!

Great Movie. This is a time travel type movie so the history of Trek IS going to change. Another reality perhaps??? That doesn't mean that all things trek we know didn't happen. Its just another reality. As sci-fi fans we should all be used to this. Change is sometimes good and this perspective of Trek was really good. I'm ready for the next movie with this crew.

Too many sfx can ruin a movie, like it did this one. I'm glad I didn't pay full price. I am a die hard Trek fan spawning from the 60's, and I didn't like this one. Sorry.

I've been waiting a long time to be able to say I really loved a Star Trek movie. The last one was The Undiscovered Country.

I loved this movie.

That doesn't mean to say I didn't find fault. I picked the same nits that have been nitpicked in the previous posts. But the fact is that the movie was good enough to overlook those problems and just enjoy the movie. I felt, despite the flaws, it had at its core those things that make Star Trek "Star Trek."

In the end, the flaws really didn't matter. As it has been pointed out even TWOK is chuck full of problems. Oh, and BTW, in that movie, the flagship of the Federation was crewed with cadets who were called into action in an emergency.

Even though the biggest thing to bother me was Kirk's instant captaincy, I think you can twist logic enough to make it work. In the DS9 episode Valiant, a Red Squad cadet is given a field commission of captain. You have to remember that a big chunk of the fleet was destroyed in the encounter with Nero at Vulcan. Kind of a Wolf 359 situation. That took out not only a lot of trained Starfleet personnel, but a ton of cadets as well. So, like I said, if you twist hard enough, maybe you can justify that.

And as for the Spock/Uhura thing: I kind of like the idea. I always thought they had good chemistry in TOS. Plus, maybe in the sequel, they can bring on a hot new Christine Chapel, say, Jessica Alba, and she and Uhura can fight it out over him..... Okay.... focus....

Anyway, the critics have the right to be, well, critics. I told people before the movie that if I thought it sucked, I'd be bitching about it for years. I'm going on seven years now for Nemesis, and I won't even go into Voyager.

Different people have different opinions. I'm sure there's even someone out there whose all time favorite Trek character is Wesley Crusher. Maybe.... At least one...

Nah!

People today are so easily amused...the proof is in the White House. Meanwhile, instead of wasting $12 on fiction, I'm putting the money towards a physics degree so I can go invent some of this stuff.

Uber:

"The God's honest truth to whoever wants to hear it?"

Judging from the amount of responses you are generating: NO ONE WANTS TO HEAR YOU. You are entitled to your opinion, but don't be arrogant enough to think that your opinion is "truth."

I think your handle is point enough "Uber Critic," which translates to "Over Critic" as in overly critical. Yep, you got it in one.

Seems like the only people who have any problem with this movie are the super Star Trek nerds. And really, that's a good thing. Considering how absolute suck Star Trek has been in the last 20 years I'm glad they're disappointed. You've got 4 seasons of bad tv shows to enjoy. This movie is closer to the original series than anything since Wrath of Khan. Cuz it's fun.

Great Movie!! Of course its a time travel movie so things are going to change. As Sci-Fi fans we see this all the time...Go back in time, change things, timeline is altered. Why not do this with Trek. I thought it was refreshing. A new "Timeline" so to speak. It doesn't mean that all the things we know trek mean nothing, it simply means that this is a different timeline. Different possibilities. I think change is good. It keeps the whole Star Trek drama interesting. I'm ready for the next film with this cast.

Opps...Double posted... Sorry.

Oh for pity's sake people - its a film , pure and simple . Its fun and exciting and to be honest I felt the leap from the old style feel was most welcome - and this from someone who watches the who shows repeatedly. I felt it was simply outstanding - as did my star trek fearing wife

The Vulcan solution to saving Romulus from their sun going supernova was to turn it into a black hole instead?

Really... wtf? How does that possibly make things better? So the benefit of imploding the sun rather than having it explode is....

Spock won't show ANY emotion to his mother, father, co-workers, the science council or himself,... but he'll make out with Uhura...repeatedly. WTF?!?

The transporters can beam people to and from the planet while orbiting at a speed in the TENS OF THOUSANDS of miles per hour but 2 people falling at a couple of hundred miles per hour is too difficult? Really? wtf?

If Bones has to say "I'm a doctor not a physicist." the WHY ARE YOU ON THE BRIDGE AND NOT IN SICKBAY?! Aren't you now CMO? Weren't there people wounded in sickbay?

Black holes will destroy planets and stars buuuuut ships can fly through unharmed and travel through time and space safely. Really? Is that the best that Abrams can come up with? Not flying around the sun really fast, or concentrated phaser fire or, oh, I dunno... building a time machine?

There isn't one single ship or planetary defense or some kid with a bb gun on the ENTIRE PLANET OF VULCAN that could shoot the extension cord plugged into the drill? If it was so simple for Spock to do it at the climactic ending then why not the rest of Starfleet?

Why is everyone running all over the ship? It's not that friggin big. And why don't they take the turbolifts?

Kirk joins the cadets as they depart for Starfleet Academy promising to complete the 4 year course in 3 years. How does he manage to accomplish this feat for the rest of the entire cast?

Didn't Kirk's hands swell as a result of an allergic reaction to the Retinox 5 that McCoy injected into him? Also, did anybody else notice the resemblance of the red matter to a particular Rambaldi device? Is Spock Rambaldi?

CDH said: "Spock won't show ANY emotion to his mother, father, co-workers, the science council or himself,... but he'll make out with Uhura...repeatedly. WTF?!?"

Well... Yeah! Wouldn't you? I mean... Come on...!

I totally agree but I have two more points to consider well ok maybe three.

1) The actor playing Chekov has got to go his fake Russian accent was so bad it was actually was distracting in the film.

2) A love triangle with Kirk and Spock was awkward at best and really odd (Kirk always should get the girl not Spock for heaven’s sake)
3) ILM did a masterful job re-creating the Enterprise (and for $30 Million they should have) I would love to have seen a bit more ship to ship combat as in Star Trek II The Wrath of Khan. Nothing appeals to the 25 and younger crowd (me) better than a good car chase…..and in space it is a great ship to ship combat sequence with one ship cutting into another with pieces flying off ETC. We would love to see what ILM could do with a large budget and two ships squaring off against each other…..I am sure it would be amazing. Nice job Mr. Abrams…….Good Robot…….Good Robot.

wingman:

I hate to sat this, but Anthon Yelchin, who played Chekov is Russian.

@ fl 223: LOL

12. Vulcan has no weapons on the planet to destroy the drill.

13. Get one Federation captain to talk and Earth's entire defense grid goes bye-bye.

14. Oh whatever.... I loved the movie anyway.

The movie is too rushed and inconsistent. The plot is infested with convenient moments.

I'm not impressed by the acting either. Chekov sounded like a retard mimicking the original. I was half expecting Sylar, oops, Spock to put the dude out of his misery. The guy who plays Kirk was not convincing. Too young and, err, cheerful.

I'm glad the movie is just a silly AU, which is why I'm not too worried about canon, etc. :)

Definitely Galaxy Quest material, except I liked GQ much better.

Next on Neo Trek 2: girly Klingons!

12. Vulcan has no weapons on the planet to destroy the drill.

13. Get one Federation captain to talk and Earth's entire defense grid goes bye-bye.

14. Oh whatever.... I loved the movie anyway.

To quote Monty Python: "It's people like you wot cause unrest!". Thomas Mill like anybody else is entitled to their *informed* opinion. I, however don't agree with this list of nitpicks. I only can concur with the one regarding the engine room/engineering section design, if only, for reason of its scale. As far as I was concerned, the rest worked. Alien creatures in the ST universe have been referenced either through dialogue in novels and fanfic or shown in comics, ST:TOS and the first 6 movies (remember the Mugato and the Klingon dog-beast in ST III?). Perhaps, the business of time travel through singularities can't be accurate for whatever 'reasons unknown'. Ergo, Nero can't go back to SAVE HIS PLANET. We as an audience don't need to know why and not everything needs to be wrapped up with a neat little bow, Fan-Boy! Besides, had we been given some expository explanation, it would have likely wound up, in yet more techno-babble and wasn't that one of *the* biggest complaints we had about Star Trek's later incarnations? Too many improbability engines! When Kirk was ejected en route, Spock would have known there was a Federation facility on Delta Vega that wasn't too distant from Vulcan. The impression I got is that he was dealing with an extraordinary individual in Kirk, anticipating his breaking out of the brig. It was his only logical move and it wasn't likely he would have stranded Kirk there permanently. As for the drilling rig, since we don't know what powers it and given the level of energy it expends, isn't it possible that a by-product energy wave could've cut off communications and transport capability? The idea and intent was to imaginatively resuscitate and reinvigorate The Franchise which had hit a creative cul-de-sac. JJ Abrams and the Bad Robot crew get full credit from me for doing exactly that while remaining true to the *spirit* of Gene Roddenberry's vision and taking us where we hadn't gone before.

12. Vulcan has no weapons on the planet to destroy a drill from space with no defenses.

13. Get one Federation captain to talk and Earth's entire defense grid goes bye-bye.

14. Oh whatever.... I loved the movie anyway.

I truly hope the world does end in 2012. It would be worth the end of life to get rid of the idiots who actually thought this movie was worth seeing.

The movie has made $31 million in under two days. So obviously someone likes it.

According to my loving engineer of a husband, the new engine room actually looks like a REAL engine room with all the pipes and stairs. Better than the plastic panels and carpeted floors of before ...

To: Son of a Maui Portagee

Sorry about my confusion.

As for the wrter's strike, I do recall JJ Abrams mentioning wanting to alter the scirpt, but the strike was in full swing...so therefore, as you said...I have to consider that. I just wish Abrams had gone back, post strike and added things like the training sequences and fixed the time travel issue--also it would have been nice to see the threat, this time, coming from a closer in source, not angry aliens looking for revenge. Finegan would have been a nice villain. He was Kirk's foil in Star Fleet Academy, as revealed in a episode of the original series.

All in all, what can one do but invent one's own original stories and characters? This is Paramount's baby, and what is, is...and can't be changed.

As for the creative financing, I am glad you pointed that out, because that is exactly what this has to be, as much of the ship's interior in the enginering area was shot on location in a winery to save money. And the set's for the Enterprise, Vulcan, and Nero's ship, could have only cost 10 to 15 miilion...and I am being generous. And you can bet that ILM only had maybe 20 million of the budget. The costumes couldn't have cost that much, and they didn't pay for any major stars that could have depleted the budget, so I would guess this film really cost about 65 million dollars to produce, or it should have...afterall, Paramount owns its own sound stages and has its own stage crews and craftsmen, so this film was largely done at cost to them. That's like throwing your own house party for 100 dollars, using other's money (friends in place of movie investors), and claiming that it really cost you 300 dollars, so you can embezzle the rest of the cash.

To: Piper

Tell your husband he is correct, but according to JJ Abrams himself, they filmed those sequences on location in the manufacturing facilities of a winery. Those are real tanks and pipes...not a fabricated set.

I agree with most of these points except for 11 and 1 - the clown hands got a big laugh in the screening I went to. The film's humor works on many levels and that's a good thing, in my book. And who says the monsters shouldn't be like that? Just because they couldn't be done like that for the past shows/movies doesn't mean it shouldn't be done now. Remember the CGI beasts they did in Voyager?

On point 8, I don't think the (general, broader) audience needs to know anything about that mining ship from the future other than the fact that it's Romulan and, you know, "from the future".

For example, what the hell is "red matter"? Who cares! You don't need to know anything about it other than the fact that it looks cool and is a convenient plot device, like the "genesis device" was in the second movie.

There are a lot of contrivances in the plot - some of them good, some of them bad. But I loved the movie and I'd highly recommend it to Trek and non-Trek fans alike.

Uber:

Your financial ignorance is astounding. You have absolutely no basis for anything you are saying. Please. Please. Stop.

“I loved the movie. It was exciting. I haven' t felt like that since wrath of khan. Yes, canon was thrown out. If you sit and nit pick all the tiny details you'll find that they don't jell...but who went to see this for a dissertation? I went to enjoy it. I'm excited that the familiar Star Trek Universe I've always known will be continued in a way that I'm not going to automatically "Know" what should happen.”

that is exactly how I feel! there isn’t a star trek episode or movie that can escape close scrutiny. i went in with an open mind and came out thoroughly surprised. as someone who has been a star trek fan since the mid-‘70s, I can accept that a new timeline has begun and now, as a fan, I will get to enjoy a new bunch of stories along this new line.

btw: anton yelchin (the actor who played chekov) was born in russia. i find it hilarious that people are trying to pick apart his accent.

Uber Critic,

I don't know that Finnegan could carry a whole movie as the central villain. But it definitely would have nice to have him there as a foil. I mean everyone else got to punch Kirk so why wasn't he there to get in his licks? The cadet that threw the first punch in the bar should have been named Finnegan. And Finn should have been the one to rat out Kirk on the Maru.

But I suppose it's something that his shimmery cadet shirt at least put in an appearance - I just never knew it was made so by lots of tiny Starfleet deltas.

I can't say that I agree with you that Abrams personally pocketed the change. But I am amused at your suggestion that that might be the real reason he chose 35mm film.

"I didn't see it yet, but I hope they didn't dumb in down for the American Audience, (Like they had to do to new Battlestar Galactica tv series) because the world wide audience is much larger." - Jasben

Seeing as you are probably not an English speaking person, I can forgive you for your spelling and capitalization errors. But saying that a movie needs to be made dumb for the American audience is like saying that all Asian people know martial arts.

And are we even talking the same Battlestar Galacticas here, because the original was campy. and fairly stupid, which was normal for B-level scifi shows of the Seventies.

The next time you want to generalize an opinion about an entire nation, maybe you shouldn't pick a show that was remade with a more visceral and intelligent storyline than its predecessor.

And trust this from a guy who watches a lot of international TV, America isn't the only country to dumb down its shows for its audiences.

Okay, I am not a techno-geek. I am not a sex-less MIT grad, or anything close. I just love the Star Trek franchise, and I am fearful for it's continuation if left in the hands of someone as superficial and impressed by flash as JJ Abrams. His previous directing/screenwriting credits prove he doesn't have the necessary "chops" to handle anything close to this scale/scope not to mention the attention to detail required by the diehard fans. I have so many issues with the plot (the change to the timeline doesn't bother me a bit) and most of the issues were already covered by others, but REALLY!! The Federation flagship doesn't have any officers aboard except Pike, so they have to populate ALL the important posts on the ship with Cadets? Huh? I felt sorry for the Chief Engineer on board, who had to turn over his post to a guy from a distant Federation outpost who didn't know ANYTHING about the Enterprise and who manages to get himself stuck in a gerbil maze water tunnel with relief valves that are on the bottom rather than the top of the tunnel?
Yeah, that not a technical nit pick, that's just stupid. So is jettison-ing the engine's core, but apparently the "core" wasn't necessary for propulsion away from the gravitational pull of a black hole, or the return trip home? Come on, that's not nit-picking, it's a minor detail that JJ Abrams just can't handle. All of these plot issues could have been easily addressed/fixed (except the timeline changes). For pete's sake, I'm not really technical but a cadet on probation gets to bypass ALL military ranks and become captain, and there wasn't a SINGLE other person on board who might have been a bit more qualified? Certainly not cadet Sulu, whose responsibility was to pilot the Enterprise out of space dock, but who apparently had NEVER DONE IT IN PRACTICE, EVEN ONCE ? Really? Had EVERY officer in Starfleet died already? The people who are bringing this stuff up aren't trying to impress everyone with their intelligence by finding technical flaws/details. They are really complaining about the way these things distracted from the enjoyment of the movie as a whole. I liked the cast/crew, action, special FX, editing, almost EVERYTHING else about this movie except the lack of attention to detail regarding the story (screenplay) and for that I hold JJ Abrams accountable. I suggest Paramount find someone else with higher standards to direct the next one. That's my "two cents".

Another WTF for me was the musical notes introduced even before the actual Trek footage got on screen. It had a sort of Clint Eastwood spaghetti western feel to it and seemed to maintain it through most of the picture. I didn't find it bad - just different and sort of interesting. Possibly an homage to the BTTF trilogy?

Note to JJ Abrams: I liked the way Kirk filled out his tighty-whitey's. See, I CAN find something to love about this movie. Gonna have to send a probe back in time to alert Newton that the laws of physics don't apply to space-dock for the Enterprise being located in a corn field in Iowa?

blondetrekgirl,

I agree the script had problems but that was more than likely because of the writers' strike whose union counts Abrams as a member. There's no way that it could be totally Abrams fault as he wanted to change things but couldn't. If it was anyone's it was Paramount's and the other studios refusing to treat writers as deserving of a decent piece of the creative returns pie.

When I saw this movie the E did not just shoot out one warp core but multiple warp cores (plural). See my WTF previous. Apparently it had plenty to spare.

But I have to say for years I was grateful ToS had been spared the warp core ejection cliche. I hope your one core turns out to be true because what I thought I saw appeared to be making up for each and every episode of ToS that failed to use said cliche,

“Gonna have to send a probe back in time to alert Newton that the laws of physics don't apply to space-dock for the Enterprise being located in a corn field in Iowa?”

if you are going to build a spacecraft to be able to function within the gravity well of a planet, should you not construct it on a planet?

Shaun,

You are just spouting Orci misconceptions of science gibberish.

You don't have to be on the surface of a planet to be in its gravity well. Also gravity as is experienced on the surface of the Earth is not uniform. It varies from place to place with density and altitude.

You and Orci have some serious retconning to explain how Riverside, Iowa became the most stable place on the planet to earn Earth norm status for scientific calibration.

Also, any Lunar colony of the period would already have its artificial gravity calibrated to Earth norm so any plausible earthbound argument would make even MORE sense on the moon. Right down to building it in the cornfields of the New Riverside Lunar colony. Plus on the moon you can easily vacuum test it before actually having to go into orbit - not to mention that it is easier to get into orbit there.

"You are just spouting Orci misconceptions of science gibberish."

my undergrad degree is in economics, not physics. and to be honest, i do not "spout" anything without researching it and attempting to learn. i thought i was posing a logical question...for someone educated in the finer points of physics.

"Seen the movie last night better than t]The Next Generation movies."

I liked the movie. I liked First Contact better.

I hear ya, Sean, that wouldn't be me.

I think it's called "space-dock" because it's in space, and that the reason it needs to be in space is because of zero gravity. Probably the gravitational pull on Earth would prohibit the assembly of the Enterprise components? Oh gosh, now I'm getting dragged into a technical discussion on the finer points of "Trek lore" and that's NOT the point I want to make. I brought up a few minor things to illustrate my point that: An attention to detail is what makes a good movie great. I wanted this movie to be great which it was very capable of being, with just a little more attention to story/plot line. Just have it make a little sense is all I'm asking!
(Apparently it's not JJ Abrams the Director's fault if Son of a Maui Portagee is to be trusted) .

I am still up in the air about this film. I want to say that I liked it, I can't say that I did. Entertaining as it was, there were some flaws, and instead of rehashing the top 11 WTF list. I will just embellish with my own comments.

JJ Abram to this movie is like Kirk on the Kobeyashi Maru test. Instead of creating something that would tell a story based on the original timeline of the original series, he uses Nero and Spocks conflict to go back in time and radicly change the time line to give them more excuse to expand whatever creative license they have to do this movie. With that note, I was a little disapointed.

Speaking of the Kobeyashi Maru test. According to ST 2 Wrath of Khan, it was pointed out that Kirk was acomodated for original thinking. Instead we see him on a court marshall hearing and suspended. Also pointed out in the same movie, Spock mentioned that he never took the test, suddenly as it turns out, he was the one who wrote it, and accused Kirk for cheating. I could have done without this cavalier disposition of Kirk, during the test eating an apple, and then pointing his finger like a pretend gun shooting at the klingon ships as they are expoding to bits on the screen. I mean cmon, at least make it look like you are not cheating. Anywa I though that was a bit hokie.

Lets talk about Chekov for a moment. Did not like this characterization, nor the fact that he was already and ensign on board the Enterprise. While Kirk, Uhura, and McCoy were cadets. I would have left him out and bring him on board in a later sequel.

I always thought that these new actors had some big shoes to fill, and I think I was right in saying that. Most of the characters were fine, and some were spot on. Again, did not care for Chekov. Sorry to say this, to Chris Pine, but I would have preffered a slightly older more mature looking Kirk. MHO. Everyone else was spot on.

Also could have done without this romantic connection between Spock and Uhura. I can understand the turbo lift scene, but I thought the transporter kiss was entirely out of line, and unnecesary.

I may have more a little later on, but I wil leave this much for all to ponder on.

Well I got to see it for free- earned a tix from MovieWatchers- heh heh- even scored some free popcorn- It was visually impressive- Bones and Scotty were funny. The two guys who are dead in real life woulda liked it. Shatner shoulda had a cameo though. Uhura chasing after Spock and not doing Kirk- ugh?! And it is - WHERE NO MAN HAS GONE BEFORE- MAN MAN MAN MAN MAN MAN MAN MAN MAN- as in mankind- you leftist commie nazi pc police feminist fruitbags. Happy you voted for that asshole bo body odor? How dare he view this in the WH- fix the economy stupid marxist dope- President Pantywaist they call him- his decisions are as brain suspending as the plots in this movie- but less entertaining and more destructive that Vulcan blowing up! (Dumb).

After watching and enjoying the movie, JJ Abrams has effectively created a new timeline. For all you fanboys, trekkies , or trekkers or what ever you call yourselves, too bad! JJ has effectively destroyed or created an an exceptable alternate reality. Im surprised a majority of you trekkies are not up in arms.

“JJ has effectively destroyed or created an an exceptable alternate reality. Im surprised a majority of you trekkies are not up in arms.”

i do not believe you can marginalize “trekkies.” stereotypes are just that…stereotypes. there are some of us (fans of gene roddenberry’s vision) who are quite willing to accept a new timeline.

Shaun,

I applaud you for making the effort to research and encourage you to cite your sources and explain why they misled you to Orci-speak.

On the other hand Roberto Orci claimed to have researched the needs for gravity well "calibration" and laced his explanation with gravity metrics of atmosphere and pressure. Clearly his effort was not as high a caliber as it could have been.

My problem is I would have greater respect for the creative team if they just simply admit that they blew the science on the need to be on the surface. Just a simple "Sorry guys, we blew it! We fell in love with the painting and thought we could come with an explanation but we can't." Instead of sending Orci to make the interview rounds sounding like a 'science is magic' space operatist."

“I applaud you for making the effort to research and encourage you to cite your sources and explain why they misled you to Orci-speak.”

i am not sure i was misled. i am just going by an old textbook. as i said, i posed the question for someone who is actually educated in physics – like a high school science teacher or a professor.

All Presidents watch films in the White House, that is why it has a movie theater--one that Obama did not build, BTW, and one where Bush and family watched a number of films, not to mention the first Bush admnistration.

Ronald Reagan, the most famous Repubilican since Lincoln, screened E.T. in the White House with Spielberg along as an invited guest. You hypocrites need to quit.

PS: The Bible clearly says that "God Hates Hypocrites"...and it says it several times. You can't be holier than thou, and then play the role of Hypocrites, that is the reason why God made a Hell, to house spirits like yours.

Re:Spock and Uhura on the T-pad

At this point in the movie, He's going down knowing that Vulcan is toast and that means Pon Farr is toast. I could quite easily see any Vulcan in his position, i.e. probably planning to eventually end the relationship because of a previous P.F. commitment, thinking to themselves "Oh what the hell, time to explore other options."

As for Uhura leaving her post: She had a Bluetooth earpiece before they were invented. I would think that hers would allow for even more mobility than the ones we are familiar with, Not to mention that this Uhura is a student of linguistics which means she probably can figure out how to tell the computer what to do faster than pushing buttons. I'm thinking of that classic scene in THE NAKED TIME where the special water inebriated Riley kept out pushing Uhura button for button. I'd love to see him try that with this Uhura.

Maybe this is because of P.F., but doesn't it seem odd that the Vulcans, who had warp drive before Earth, haven't more widely settled the galaxy than humans? I suppose we can count the Romulans, but still it seems illogical for Vulcans not to have spread their civilization out further. I mean, the Fabrini did so what killed it for their culture?

I agree with a lot of the others on here that there are little details that should've been worked out; every single Star Trek film always had something not quite right about it, perhaps First Contact might be the exception. I didn't think I would enjoy this re-imaging of the Trek 23rd century era, I did, I like to see what comes of it. (Spoiler : Spock's Mother died.) In TOS, both of Spock's parents were alive, so an altered history will be canon for now on, apparently. Trek XII MUST have William Shatner (before the events of Generations) reflecting on his past which has an issue like the War on Darfur that tests Kirk and Crew. Perhaps Trek XIII will have a young Khan as the main villain.
Trek XIV could be like The Voyage Home, Trek XV could have a ST-TNG era connection. Lots of possibilities for future films. I also hope a new TV series could exist in the timeframe of Trek XI with a new ship and a new crew, referencing that film! Live Long, Prosper, Good Luck!!! :D

Markus McLaughlin / linuxglobe @ twitter.com / Hudson, MA

To: Kevinsfocalpoint

You got it!!! This is about Paramount coming up with an excuse to take creative license with established Star Trek canon, not to tell a better story, rather, this is about stealing, and or, diminishing story and character authorship that may be owed to the Roddenberry estate and writers like Harlen Elison. And JJ Abrams was pretending to stand-up for writers during the writer's strike by not working on the script, and yet, he was helping to steal from them all along? What a nice guy?

Most of you have made your opinions known..that you hate the movie.

We get it. Unfortunately, you are already being proven to be in the minority. This reminds me of when Star Wars came out in 1976. Many hardcore sci-fi fans had the same kind of reaction.

So...continue to post your dissatisfaction..and when the next one comes out. DON'T WATCH!!!

Just saw it and it kicked ass! It wasn't"old trek" which I love,but that's ok.The franchise has been evolving for over 40 years.This is the next step.To all those"old school haters",go see the movie and then tell me what you think.

To: BlondeTrekGirl

Kudos...and Bravo!!! Thank you for adding to this discussion and your intelligent views. You and Son of a Maui Portagee, have added greatly and impressively to the debate surrounding the new Star Trek film.

If you haven't had a chance to see Serenity or Stargate: Continuum before...I am certain that you will love them. The latter deals with similar timeline issues and pulls them off admirably, ending with a smart twist ending that is more than worth the trip. Clearly, those who love science fiction and fantasy wrote these two films...and although Serenity has no time travel elements, "wow" does it deliver!!! It is the perfect Star Trek film, but it happens not to be an actual Star Trek film.

The villain will have you amazed from the point you first see him, within the first 5 minutes of the movie. He is a scene stealer, and makes a huge impression on caliber with the first time we saw Darth Vader in Star Wars, the character and the actor that plays him are that great! Known as the Operative, he is brilliant, elegant, vicious and fully aware that he is indeed evil--but evil with a purpose, and that is to do good. He actually believes that he is getting his hands dirty for the betterment of all, and that makes him especially dangerous as he has faith in his mission. As for our hero, the Captain of the Serenity, he believes in personal freedom...and that is his credo, and what he lives by, and is willing to die for. It is amazing to see these philosophies clash, both with well thought-out good reasoning, leading to a damning discovery in the big reveal. Along the way, lives are lost...and our merry band of heroes are left battered, bruised, and ultimately shattered. Serenity has a great perspective on life...and was smartly written and directed by Joss Whedon. It is full of love, wisdom, romance, sexuality, and rich emotion all around, including scares, poppy intellgent...and twisted humor, and self sacrifice, the kind you can feel, as if it were all real. This is weighty material that knows how to enliven things with great action and fun when, and where, appropriate. My God, what he could have done with the new Star Trek film???!!!! It is really a shame they did not hire him to steer the new voyages of the Enterprise.

Wm De Bracey:

I know what I am talking about. I grew-up in the industry.

To: You and Son of a Maui Portagee

Abrams actually would have saved money if he went digital. Why he didn't do that, or film this movie in 3D, leaves me puzzled? The point of theft comes in the form of Abrams and company, including Paramount and the writers, positioning themselves to alter Star Trek lore. In this way they get to lower any profit paticipation...or completely destroy profit participation of past Trek creators and writers who may still be owed royalties, while increasing their own royalty interest and profit partcipation therein...and this extends over to product tie-ins deals like toy sales and other Trek related product licensing deals. It s all about stealing authorship these days, to gain royalty points.

Let's be honest; taken strictly as a film, the movie is not that good. I don't care if it's Star Trek, bad writing is bad writing, and while the dialog is good, the plot is ridiculously contrived.

HOWEVER, there is enough good in the movie to far outweigh a bad plot. Who goes to see a Star Trek movie for plot anyway? I agree with what has been said before, that the "alternate timeline" is a quintessentially Ster Trekian device and the perfect way to reboot the franchise to give it a future with a clean slate.

I would add one more WTF moment: Anton Yelchin's accent. Completely awful, way over-done (yes, I know it's comedic, but that's the problem, did you believe him?) and worse than Walter Koenig's. And less excusable since Yelchin is actualy of Russian descent.

I went into this film desperately hoping to love it. I had hoped that this film would break the convention that odd numbered STAR TREK movies were, at least, not as good as the even numbered ones. Suffice to say I was a bit nervous going into this. Reviews had given me the boost in confidence I so dearly wanted before I went to see it. I returned home in silence, my mind trying to piece together what I had just witnessed. Don’t get me wrong, there were parts of the movie I truly loved but, in the end I was vary much disappointed. My only hope is that they (not meaning J.J.) make a sequel and fix it. I was led to believe that they had made STAR TREK new without destroying what came before. That was a lie. ALL that came before has been utterly destroyed. Perhaps the Guardian of Forever holds the solution.

p.s. 150 million dollars and they use a winery as the engine room of the Enterprise! Some may say it was more realistic but really, c'mon it's a STARSHIP not an NAVY ship. But I guess J.J. doesn’t know the difference.

p.s.s. "Worst STAR TREK movie, EVER!" -Comic Book Guy, The Simpsons

Also, you'll have to excuse people like Uber Critic, for whom Star Trek is not a movie franchise, but a religion. A religion with a canon that, like the Bible, is utterly self-contradictory, but must be honored as the inviolable word of God.

If you want to attack this movie for its faults, they are legion. If you want to attack this movie because it doesn't adhere to some fanatical view of established Trek lore, that's just crazy. We've already seen the results of that; the last few Trek movies were TERRIBLE. This series needed new blood, and J.J. Abrams gave it in spades.

And I'd also like to point out that this movie does NOT violate canon anyway. It does an end-run around canon by setting up an alternate timeline, allowing a new canon to be created while still leaving the old canon unscathed. The character of Spock Prime actually serves nicely to bridge these two distinct and equally valid worlds.

So, lighten up, and remember, as William Shatner observed all those years ago, "it's just a tv show."

Chekov was on the Enterprise during the first season of TOS, however he was not a member of the bridge crew. We 'know' this because Khan recognized him even though the never shared a scene in the first season episode where Khan was introduced.

This type of plot line bridge I can put up with, accept and keep going on. Apparently Abrams figured if he could get away with the WTF bs on Lost he could get away with it in a Star Trek film. Attention to detail and continuity are as much a part of Trek canon as Kirk hooking up with the chicks and his shirt coming off. Star Trek is America's mythology. These are our greek gods. This 'interpretation' is offensive and sacreligious. How will the greatest scene EVER in Trek take place now? How will Spock and Kirk fight on Vulcan over T'Pring? The best fight music in the history of film and television is now non-existent.

sigh

So, i am quite sure that I saw a concret support for a steel piller on the Kelvin, when they were taking Kirks mother to the escape pods....

Umm concret on a starship..

This was a very good movie. It didn't "destroy" Trek, it did everything to embrace what Trek is. It even followed the TOS format of showing a teaser - title - show - happy ending.

You can nitpick this film a lot, but as others have said...you can do the same with the other Trek films and even the series. I was once dared to make a list of problems with "ST3:The Search for a Script" and came away with three pages of WTF.

As for the puppet hands; I loved it. It was funny, and had the whole theatre rolling in laughter.

Finally, for those who say the new film destroys everything to come after, that is wrong. Without what has come before this timeline wouldn't exist.

This film is now third on my list of Trek films behind only ST2 & 4.

My thoughts pretty much run along the same line. Movie A-, Star Trek-ness B+.

I just want to know why the movie was...illogical...some things just made no sense at all. I find that in most of the Trek...situations just wouldn't make sense in any universe. I'm not talking about continuity from one movie to another (although it would be nice on occasion), I'm talking about just things that any intelligent sentient being would do and don't in the Trek movies, or wouldn't do and do in the Trek movies. I think the problem is that directors, producers and the movie industry feel we're idiots and it kind of makes me angry. I'm not asking for a MENSA level movie, I'm asking for some kind of common sense.

Uber Critic - thanks for the support, and you are right. I am a huge fan of both Serenity and Joss Whedon. THAT guy can get a GREAT movie (any genre) made!!! He takes pride in making sure the details are right and his characters/scripts are so good, George Lucas should weep.

Bottom line: JJ Abrams just doesn't have what it takes, if it's clout with the studio, credentials, brain power, respect/loyalty to the fans, pride in putting out a great product, whatever you want to call it.

Gail Cooke, I agree completely. If you are spending $200 million on a movie, and you are the director responsible for what gets released to the public, AND your name and reputation are at stake, wouldn't you want the story to be the best it could be?

First, Kirk and Scotty were teleported from ice planet to (I assume) a very distant Enterprise at warp speed. Then, Kirk and Spock were teleported from the Enterprise/Titan to the mining ship orbiting planet Earth.

What's up with these magical transporters!?

KirkIsJustPine

But that's just it, even going with your own estimations of this film, they spent over $150 mil and the BEST they could come up with is 3rd place? How does that add up to the promised Moses Trek?

As for ST III, didn't each and every Kirk (literal) cliff-hanging scene in this new movie pay homage to that? I swear I heard (not literally) an echo of Shatner's "I (pause) have had (pause) enough (pause) of YOU!" after the Narada refused assistance in the final battle scene.

Also, did anyone notice no starship had shields in this movie... And red matter? WTF!?

All these points are great - mine are abit fundamental... like - right out of starfleet and gets promoted to captain of the fleet's flagship?!? No seasoning on other ships before the big seat?

This whole transporter across a solar system or to a ship traveling in warp - but can't beam a person falling off a ledge?!?

V'Ger,

In the movie, they establish that young Scotty had a pet project of breaking long-distance transporter records which unfortunately lead to the untimely demise of one of Admiral Archer's beagles. This "hobby" eventually led Scott Prime to realize the equation for transwarp beaming that had vexed him since his confrontation with Gary 7.

Spock Prime gave the equation to cadet Scott and he figured out how to best apply it to get Kirk on the E. As Scotty always wanted to see the E he came along for the ride. Apparently Spock Prime used it also to get somewhere else for some other pressing business more important than cleaning up the mess he created by neglecting to activate his ship's self destruct and transwarp beaming the hell out of it in the first place when the Narada captured it.

But I have to agree, how are they going to tell further compelling Trek tales now that they've let the transwarp beaming genii out of the bottle? Since it crosses shield and warp bubbles with aplomb there's nothing to stop Starfleet from using it as an efficient photon torpedo or other weapon delivery system. Transwarp phasers anyone? Since it transcends star systems they don't even have to use a ship. I feel sorry for you and that probe in STIV. When you guys come calling in this alternate universe. You don't stand a chance. ;-)

PS I doubt even NOMAD's screens
will be up to that.

I loved the movie. I didnt go to disect and analyze every little thing. No matter how great a picture is, someone somewhere will find fault. I went to get away from reality for a couple of hours and enjoy a movie. My wife is not a Star Trek fan. But she laughed, cried, screamed and applauded during the movie. I am deaf now, but Ill be ok. LOL. Anyway Go see the movie and enjoy. Its great. WWW.RottenTomato.com has a count of 96% of the the people really liking it. Other sites are 85-90%. Live Long and Prosper!

great movie, but definitely had some WTF? moments.

Hard to believe Starfleet would promote an inexperianced cadet to Captain and turn over a ship to him, no matter how much of a hero he was.

Kirk won they lotto when he landed on the ice planet, just a few kilometers from the only other stranded person and a star fleet base. a little too lucky if ya ask me.

couple of other things as well. but screw it, everything else was greatness. bring on the sequel!

I loved that they not only violated canon, they totally destroyed canon with the alternate timeline, and opened the trek universe to an entire new realm of possibilities with these characters and the now altered timeline. Everything we’ve known before is gone and won’t necessarily happen again, and every whiney trek fan crying about canon can now STFU about them violating it. Canon no longer exists! That was pure genius on the part of everyone involved in that part of the storyline.

V'Ger once said "Also, did anyone notice no starship had shields in this movie..."

Point of correction: in the clown hands scene after Kirk convinced Pike it was a trap, Captain Pike gave the order to "Raise shields." before dropping out of warp. And after the Narada fired on them the shields were down to 30%.

helmethead said, "This whole transporter across a solar system or to a ship traveling in warp - but can't beam a person falling off a ledge?!?"

Scotty wasn't onboard at that juncture, hence Chekov's ignorance of transwarp beaming which, as you suggest, might have saved the day for Spock's mom.

Outdated textbooks not withstanding, I seem to recall Hawking determined that black holes don't destroy information. If that's true and time dilation effects are taken into account, it might be possible for someone, perhaps Spock Prime, to retrieve Amanda as the FX seemed to indicate she was fully converted into information before the singularity latched onto her transporter beam. Although there appeared to be a scream so perhaps not. If I'm wrong about the scream then perhaps that was the other pressing matter Spock Prime attended to?

I believe the Romulen commander explained the he had been preparing to enact his revenge for years. Plenty of time to outfit the ship. With out reading the prequel comic.

To: BlondeTrekGirl

Thanks to you, BlondeTrekGirl. Your commentary is very rich, thoughtful, and enlightening.

One of the greatest science fiction films of all time was written by a woman. Her name? Leigh Brackett. And the name of that film? Surprise, it's...Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back. Unfortunately, Brackett passed away from cancer before she could do the final draft of the script, so Lawrence Kasdan was hired to finish the script polish...and received the credit for her work. As for the original Star Wars film...Star Wars: (now subtitled) A New Hope, George Lucas credits his then wife, Marcia Lucas, for saving the movie from certain disaster, all thanks to her brilliant editing of the film. What we need in science fiction and fantasy film...these days especially...is the well informed voice of women who bring a sense of maturity and worldliness to the art of crafting film.

Joss Whedon's work is largely informed by women, from his late mom, to his wife, to Buffy show runner...producer Marti Nixon, and the former President of Film Production at Universal, Mary Parent, who green-llt Serenity, as well as the film's female editor. There is real thinking there thanks to the strong female influences...and that serves to raise the bar of the art form, and all art, in fact, not just in film.

Did you know that in the Golden Age of Hollywood, half of all screen writers were women---the reason why the films were so great then, I suspect. Now, however, that number has fallen drastically (the number of female screen writers, that is)...as well, the quality of film has fallen along with those numbers. Coincidence? Maybe? But most likely, it is due to the lack of female input in the creation of modern film projects.

As a male, I have always felt that genre fair, logically, and naturally, needed that female input. When I was a teen, and a comic book collector, every time a girl walked into the local comic book store, I thought, "She gets it!", and then, I'd notice, the girl would quickly lose interest in the books, etc., and leave? Now, because of the success of Xena and Buffy, hopefully that has changed...forever, and the age of the fan girl has fully come about, changing the sometimes stifling fan boy status quo. Hell, now that I think about it, the new Trek could have used several more very strong, smart, and capable, females to balance out the crew of the Enterprise and Star Fleet Academy...as leads. If they are going to give an honest effort to rebooting Trek, that is the first place to really start!!!

I find it sad that so many people, especially young males, pay to see these movies, specifically, the so-called blockbusters...aka...the high concept films, so they can say they are a part of the latest media created fad--all in an attempt to feel included in something that is measured as an event of some import in our society...while others among them just go to see the big movies release of the week, for the strict purpose of seeing things go "boom", and blow-up--story be damned, and quality of any sort, be damned? Regularly, regardless of quality, these kinds of audiences will praise anything they are fed, as the second coming? I however, know better, great films don't come along every week...and n a generation, as measured by 20 years, we'd be lucky to see 10 truly great era changing films, or even tv series, like the original Star Wars, Star Trek, or Buffy. The new Trek is not worthy of that title, not even close. My view is, if we don't stand-up and demand better of Hollywood, we will only get more of the same trash. The reason why I have made a habit of speaking-up and going against mob mentality...and demanding better of the films that we are being offered, and better of the filmmakers, and executives, who make them. I am glad to see that I am not the only outside the box thinker here. I'm glad to see that you, Blonde Trek Girl, and Gail Cooke...are demanding better, much better!!! Bravo!!!!

anachronite,

The lotto win was finding Spock Prime. Acting Captain Spock had ordered Kirk removed from his ship and sent to the nearest Starfleet facility to sit out the impending Narada conflict after Spock rushes to his conference meeting.

Also, you lost the canon lotto as this incarnation left the TV series ENTERPRISE intact as its prehistory. In fact, all the things in ENTERPRISE that didn't fit in the prime timeline are now wiped out so ENTERPRISE'S canon fits the new timeline like a glove.

don't romulan's have a safety and standards board? why would they build a giant ship with composed of platforms not a SINGLE guard-rail?

well spock prime was who I was talking about mostly, but he was close to scotty as well.

and I love Enterprise!

Did anyone catch the editing goof with Kirk sneaking around the Romulan ship with a disrupter he didn't posses until a few scenes later, and the next shot had him aiming his phaser?

Uber Critic,

Well said. And don't forget the oft neglected female composers.

And I'm with you on demanding better from Paramount. At this stage of the game I'd settle for just a decent script. It doesn't have to be perfect but something a cut above what they keep settling for in all their "reboots" of Trek.

The writing of a Trek script should have been evolving better and better all these years to the point where we are discussing whether it is going to get an Academy Award nomination or not, and universities are teaching them as "classics".

For the life of me, if Paramount was willing to go as far as they did with this reinvention and alienate all the first viewers regardless, why didn't they go for broke and hire Harlan Ellison? Oh yeah, because he has the gall to ask for what's owed him. A pittance that wouldn't even amount to the cost of the CGI blinking blue light on the right warp nacelle in this movie.

But I suppose I have to give Paramount their due I never in a million years thought they'd ever deign to hand over so much moola to someone that was a card carrying member of the WGA as J.J. Abrams is.
.

I got what I expected from this movie. The actors delivered admirably on cheesy material strung together with a weak story that hinged on some cosmic event. Pretty standard ST stuff. Using the old movie franchise as a baseline, I'd give it an "odd-numbered movie" rating.

That being said I think that there were some things that bordered on stupid:
-Bad guys in leather jackets is lazy costume design. For reference see every bad action film made since the matrix.
-The stupid lens flares on the bridge. So many lights! The first time an explosion happens, they all blow out. Scotty must spend half his time changing light bulbs.
-3 cliff hangers!?!?!!! Not even metaphors, literally 3 moments of people hanging off of things! By the third time I actually laughed out loud, which I doubt was the director's intent.

All in all, a pretty fun film. I hope they get a new director for the next film, Abrams' tv work is much better than his films are.

Sorry, that should be an "even-numbered movie" rating. :P For a Trek movie it was pretty entertaining.

anachronite,

I liked what Okuda, Bakula, and the rest of the cast were able to eventually accomplish. Ultimately, I liked ENTERPRISE stories more than the awful awful writing in its predecessor. Not to say ENTERPRISE didn't have some real klunkers.

Hey wait a minute! I'm keeping my eye on you. You are trying to find a way for me to slide this new movie from my "A part of Trek without actually being about Trek" category which includes MIRROR, MIRROR and ASSIGNMENT EARTH, and slide it over into the Trek zone.

UberCritic & blondetrekgirl, couldn't agree with you more, and you have both stated the things I was thinking about more elegantly then I could.

No one has yet really hit on the real contrivance of the Kirk/Spock Prime scene. Spock is already there, yet he waits for Kirk to show up--whom he could not know was coming--before going to the Starfleet Station where he could possibly warn someone about Nero and Vulcan's destruction? Also yeah, I wondered where he got the tree branch on Hoth, er...I mean Delta Vega, and how he made the fire without any tools. Like I said, ridiculously bad plot, ridiculously good movie.

Also, it was awfully nice of Nero to give Spock Prime that nifty coat. Good to know he didn't want him to catch cold.

I love the movie, I swear! I've seen it twice and intend to see it again. But man, the plot has more holes in it than a wheel of swiss cheese.

Seriously, this is the movie everyone's been wanting me to keep an open mind about? This is the best Abrams could do to "fix" Trek?

Destroy Vulcan and Romulus and have Spock be all emotional and run around macking on Uhura? You've gotta be outta your Vulcan minds to like this movie.

I can't wait for the future. Hopefully this crew will meet the Doomsday Machine and the machine will win. Or maybe Charlie-X will kill them all, or Harry Mudd will strand them all, or Landru will mind wipe them all. Or maybe they'll meet the Borg a few hundred years early and be assimilated. Here's hoping for the best.

blondetrekgirl,

I love yours and Gail's salient reasoning.

I agree that J.J. Abrams deserves the credit/blame for his Trek, but I have to wonder, as the existence of a plethora of Director's Cut DVDs give evidence, that it's more because he wore the hat of producer than that of director? Or maybe because he wore both? Until the studios stop involving themselves in the final cut, I'm always going to be leery of blaming a director totally when a film fails.

Addendum For Typos--

WinterMuteAu:

Thank you WinterMuteAu. i think your voice is just as elegant as anyone else's. Never hold back using it!!!

To: Son of a Maui Portagee

You know you are right, Paramount should have pulled out all the stops for this one, but they got greedy. Matt Damon would have added so many wonderful nuances to the character of Kirk if they had given him the job. I suspect that he turned it down because they refused him profit participation and I also suspect that if they had paid him his asking price, the box office right now, would be well north of 100 million dollars...and this would have a chance of being a 300 million plus film in North America alone, and double that world wide.

I really believe that having someone like Matt Damon in the captain's chair this time-out could have actually brought this film, that is, if it had a great script, a lead academy award nomination for best actor, etc. Don't get me wrong, Chris Pine was fine in the role, but a seasoned actor like Damon would have brought a certain weight to the role that would have elevated it to a different level, thusly, I am glad that you made menton of the Oscars. I would like to see that for a space genre science fiction film someday--a film that is not just viewed as some gee-wiz-bang explosion filled video game, but as a film worthy of winning an Oscar for best actor, or best actress, or even best picture. Why not, right, it is time, really for one of these high concept blockbusters to do just that???!!! Star Wars made a great era changing statement with its look, its breakthrough in special effects, and high concept, and it was truly worthy of a best picture win...and it should have won...but I tell you, it is time for another watershed moment in this genre to that extent, and if not in special effects, as far as watershed breakthroughs, more importantly for the genre, it should come in the form of earning respect, and making other acknowledge that a sci fi film can be scen on par with the best of dramatic films--in story and dramatic content, and this should have been that movie...or at least, it could have been, if Paramount had shown the guts to aim higher. Perhaps now, we will have to wait for James Cameron's Avatar to witness such a happening? Let's hope so, anyway!!!

Gilveron,

I think that Delta Vega is where the plot simply grinds to a halt as well as the film's pacing.

First off, in the original timeline Delta Vega was a desert planet near the outer rim of the galaxy and nowhere near Vulcan. Maybe its located next to the most spectacular gravitational lens in the galaxy?

Second, it is the location of the longest segment of wasted film in the entire picture. There was absolutely no need to show Spock Prime and Kirk walking across a great expanse of white to get to the Federation facility. By that time, we get it - it's an ice planet. The only reason it was included was someone was absolutely in love with fact that they managed to simulate being in an icy locale so well on the Paramount backlot and they just had to linger on it. It ground the film to a standstill precisely when things were beginning to build to a head.

Third, Nero didn't just give Spock Prime a coat but apparently he beamed him down with combustibles too. But that may well have to do with Vulcans not being well adapted to cold and Nero wanting him to live long enough to see the destruction of his home world. But you have to wonder, was Nero also planning to pick him up again so that he could drop Spock Prime on Earth's moon to watch the destruction of his other home world as well?

Fourth, coincidences? Delta Vega must be the most popular place in the universes (sic) for abandoning people: Gary Mitchell, Scotty II, Spock Prime, Kirk II...

Fifth, after hearing what Scotty did to that beagle I don't even want to imagine what he was going to do to that tribble.

Interesting lonnng list of comments. Frankly, as a LONG time Star Trek Fan. I grew up on my father's knee watching the Original Series.

I have an uncanny and annoying ability (to my family and friends) to read plot lines like the back of my hand. One thing I really enjoyed about the movie was that unlike all previous Star Trek (movies and episodes), hell almost EVERY SciFi time travel story, everything wasnt fixed in the end. I was, for once, surprised at the ending. For that alone I am impressed with the movie.... I was surprised and I didnt get what I expected. Perhaps this is at the core of many complaints. We didnt get everything we expected....

I did think the Uhura/Spock thing was a bit over done in the transporter room. Kirks Sudden rank increase is a little farfetched... Field Commisions (to first Officer) are very rarely perminant. Even donsidering the Federation lost a great deal of its fleet and personel.

Mr, Nimoy was thrilled with the movie and it recaptured his old spark for the series... who am I to argue?

“For the life of me, if Paramount was willing to go as far as they did with this reinvention and alienate all the first viewers…”

why do you generalize? it must be obvious that many of us who have been fans for over thirty years enjoyed this new film, despite its flaws. you make valid points in your critique (which i respect) but then degenerate into making specious statements like the one above.

Shaun,

You misinterpret what I meant, I wasn't saying that they HAD indeed succeeded in alienating all the first viewers only that Abrams, et al, said in interviews they thought that it was ok to RISK alienating them all, because this movie was aimed at a different "broader" audience.

yes,there were things in it that drove us die hards crazy.but it wasen't made for us.it's oviouly made for non fans.i'm just glad to see trek back on the map.and toys in the store's.i hope #2 is better

As for the mining ship being armed- It's a ROMULAN mining ship... of course it's armed! Romulans love overkill in their weapons.

The swollen hands scene was excellent!

yeah, I thought the engine room looked more like a water processing plant... who knows why? Maybe an effort to make the Enterprise look much less evolved in this respect. Remember, this is a whole new Trek universe since the destruction of the USS Kelvin.

Didn't have a problem with Spock throwing Kirk overboard... Kirk was a real problem and he already snuck aboard once to wreak havoc in Spock's view. Spock knew he'd be rescued since the pod was sending a signal out to the Delta Vega mining plant.

Yes, the fact that Kirk runs into old Spock on Delta Vega was a definite WTF... maybe Q arranged this to happen? :)

Overall though, I gave the film ten out of ten stars! I will see it again... and I highly recommend seeing it in IMAX! Amazing film. Can't wait for the sequel.

It was almost as bad as Star Trek V. Almost.

Oh my...this is a very long list of strong comments.

I saw the movie today and I thoroughly enjoyed it! I found the lens flares a bit annoying and I would agree that bits and pieces of the plot weren't rock solid but then again I loved the BSG finale too, despite its handful of plot oddities.

This is also coming from someone who is a long time Trek fan (although clearly not as much as one lady sitting next to us, who was absolutely overjoyed by the end of the movie). I'm also not that big of a JJ fan (I like Fringe...but that's about it) and I'm fairly certain I'm not a studio plant (really?...I mean, really?). I liked this movie because I enjoyed the plot, I enjoyed the action, I enjoyed the characters, and I enjoyed the humor. Star Trek got a royal treatment in this movie and I found it incredible. There are definitely things I didn't like but, honestly, most of the things that people have pointed out here are, in my opinion, either very small issues or things that can be logically explained if you think about it.

Now, for those of you who seem to be continually bashing the film and invalidating the opinions of those who did like it: wtf? You've been sitting on threads for months now talking about how this movie was going to be terrible and now that it has been successful (yes, it has) you're trying your hardest to validate what you've been saying by pushing forward every single fault, real or perceived, in this movie and coming up with wild conspiracy-theory-like explanations for why people like it (everything from studio plants to victims of JJ brainwashing). Now, there's absolutely nothing wrong with not liking the movie! You guys all have valid points, although I do think that many of you probably did see it with pre-conceived notions and weren't able to enjoy it...but please stop insulting the rest of us just because we take a different view on things, it's embarrassing. If you want to do something about it I'd recommend writing to JJ and Co (seriously) and tell them what you did and didn't like about the movie...except do it politely and with proper grammar or they'll ignore it. If enough of you tell them what you didn't like then hopefully the next movie will be more appealing to you.

very good. i as a star trek fan saw a lot of mistakes, even it is a different past caused by spock and co. the uhura thing is strange, the love to spock even more, inspite of spock´s human side. even more strange that kirk was a cadet and became a captain and spock remains a commander...on the big scale the film is a good idea but JJ wanted to make to much a good action-scifi-movie instead of looking better at star trek facts. damn you JJ, i hope the genre is not totally down cause of this!!

Dugger, I couldn't agree more with your post. While I can understand everyones statement about ST needing a revamp. I really have no problems with the acting, or plot, I just really don't see the need to do away with cannon altogether.

My biggest WTF!?!?! is the redo the TECH. Flame me all you want on this I don't care, but This movie is supposed to take place between ST:Enterprise and ST:TOS right? then why does this ship look like it belongs between ST:TOS and ST:TMP? Forget Kirks "clown hands" what about "clownish looking Enterprise"? Blue glowing deflector dish and blue warp bussards? umm ok.

The phasers...did they raid the dollar stores for all the chrome plated toy laser guns they had? My Nephew has more realistic toy guns than in the movie! (that he got at the dollar store BTW)

The Tricorders...Ok, again, these look like they belong between ST:TOS and ST:TNG not something that is supposed to be Pre TOS.

In 40+ years of Star Trek being on the air, syndication included, there's no reason to just toss everything away and and forget about what has brought us to this "refit" of the movie.

Like I said, flame me or what ever i really don't care.

Uber Critic,

Where are you from? It's only entertainment, why so harsh?

While I understand some of the changes from the past star treks, but that is what happens with reboots, personally I felt they kept the relationships between the characters and that allowed me to forgive the changes, I loved it.

I've read the reviews, articles and comments prior to seeing the movie. But now that I've seen it, the thing that really hit me was that THIS Star Trek is now an alternate universe story line. This opens a lot of new character and story development for the franchise, but leaves me a little sad that the Star Trek I know and grew up with is now in another reality! Of course, it's only a T.V. show!

Well having read this I won't waste my $$.
Just wait for it on cable,watch & ignore it.
Cannon shall rule.

How about 11 things I don't like about blogging about movie! well JUST ONE, it is a movie NOT the end of life a we know it. CAN you guys just please just wrote something with meaning? OR NOT POST ANYTHING AT ALL! the movie is great no matter what thing you guys think are wrong or stuiped. You now what just stop writing and get a gob review books so you comment will not wast my time!.

My biggest complaint with the new movie was the lack of moral compass throughout the entire movie. I really believe that Roddenberry always wanted some type of moral story told in all of his creations and those one had none. The whole movie is full of revenge themes without anyone questioning it. When Spock asks Kirk to not show mercy to Nero, that was the one opportunity for this new incarnation to rise above the vengeful, eye-for-an-eye cycle. Instead, we pander to the idea that under the right circumstances, it's alright to exact revenge. Would it have been so bad to offer? We know Nero would have refused, but by making the offer and not trivializing it with Spock's off the cuff remark, the good guys would have risen above the bad guys.
Also, I gotta say that the whole alternate timeline is just a cop-out to try not to upset the fans while giving the series a new paint job and some shiny new rims so that non-Trek fans will hopefully like the movie.
I like the movie overall. I laughed and even thought the opening was good. I just don't think it was true Trek. Like others have said, it's Trek-Lite, easy on the story, full of pretty lights.

Toddric,

Your projector must have broken down. In the movie I saw after Spock questioned the need to show mercy, Kirk explained the implications of NOT making the attempt and then proceeded to offer to beam the survivors off the Narada. The Narada refused at which point Kirk set down the groundwork for his classic STIII "I...have..had...enough..of YOU!" line and blew them to smithereens to better facilitate their desire to die first.

So I just watched the movie. I think it's a good movie... not great, but good. Worth seeing. I was surprised that they would incorporate time travel so soon. Then I relied in creating an alternate universe he can free himself from canon a bit.

Getting back to the purpose of the original post, and adding to the 11 WTF? moments list, don't forget to add:
12. Wasn't that nice of Spock Prime to have a winter coat waiting for Kirk to wear on their icy trek to the nearby outpost on Delta Vega (where they meet up with Scotty?) Convenient...

JIM,

I would say that an enterprise that sets its sights on sucking more than $450 million dollars out of the world's economy is quite a bit more than some Super 8mm home movie.

With that kind of money it can, indeed, quite literally affect the life and death of millions (See: SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE)

Also, let me explain how this writing thing works:

No one here is forcing you to read this. If you find it a complete waste of your time then don't look at it. It's that simple. You will do your blood pressure and heart a great service if you just look away. No peeking. Stop looking, JIM. Turn away. JIM. Stop it. Just scroll past what I've typed. Stop. Caught you. Honest, JIM, there's nothing that I will type that's deserving of your devotion. Quit looking at it for Pete's sake if not your own......

@wngman664: "2) A love triangle with Kirk and Spock was awkward at best and really odd (Kirk always should get the girl not Spock for heaven’s sake)"

LOL Hell no! You are male, aren't you? This is such an amazing phenomenon going on for over 40 years - for some reason, every male in the universe thinks that Kirk is the guy women would go crazy about, while in factfemale Star Trek fans always prefered Spock. It was even refered to by the Sisko/Dax dialogue in Deep Space 9 episode "Trials and Tribble-ations." Just goes to show that men generally have no clue what women want. :)

@wngman664: "2) A love triangle with Kirk and Spock was awkward at best and really odd (Kirk always should get the girl not Spock for heaven’s sake)"

LOL Hell no! You are male, aren't you? This is such an amazing phenomenon going on for over 40 years - for some reason, every male in the universe thinks that Kirk is the guy women would go crazy about, while in factfemale Star Trek fans always prefered Spock. It was even refered to by the Sisko/Dax dialogue in Deep Space 9 episode "Trials and Tribble-ations." Just goes to show that men generally have no clue what women want. :)

Ok... I've only read like a QUARTER of the comments on this article, and am about to blog about it myself on my own site. But, there were a few comments that kind of angered me.

First off, these 11 moments were great, yeah we all went WTF, but we enjoyed 90% of them. Especially the clown hands. God, that was great. But, moving on. I see a few people asking "How can THIS happen now?!"

The answer? It won't. This is an ALTERNATE TIME LINE. If you watched Back to the future, think of the Romulan Mining ship as "Future Biff". He went back to 1955 and gave himself the Almanac, right? TOTALLY changing the 1985 that Doc and Marty went back to.

Nero came back in time and as SOON as he popped up, he destroyed George Kirk's ship. THIS is the Almanac. It sends the Star Trek universe you know and love spiraling out of control. Let me point out a few things:

Pike: At the end of the movie, he's in a wheelchair, yes, but nowhere NEAR how badly he was in the original series when he came back. He was so badly hurt and immobilized, he made Christopher Reeves look like a gymnast.

Uhura and Spock: HEY! Didn't Star Trek set a new "thing" by having KIRK and Uhura kiss? I think so. Chalk ANOTHER ONE up for the "alternate time line".

Speaking of Spock: Spock being captain (although acting captain) before Kirk? No wonder "future" Spock looked... Confused.

Let's beam aboard a ship at Warp speed! Spock brought this "formula" to Scotty to aide he and Kirk in their mission. "cheating" as it was brought up by Young Kirk. So now, forever and always (in the next movies) the crew of the Enterprise can have more exciting escape sequences and such.

These are just a FEW points, but I think said point was made at the Back to the Future reference. Old Star Trek universe? Equals "original timeline" in back to the future.

2009 Movie? Start of a new era, starting over at 1955. Biff has the Almanac, and we're in for a WHOLE NEW ride.

The greatest travesty is that I actually read the entire thread...

That aside, did anybody else catch the parallel of Spock teaching something to Scotty that he hadn't invented yet? Think Voyage Home, with Scotty trying to procure "transparent aluminum."

If someone else beat me to it, i apologize. It all the flame tossing and childish pissing and moaning made it hard to glean any actual substance by about the halfway point.

Yes but even in Back to the Future the heroes FIXED IT! They didn’t get to the alternate 1985 and say "Oh well", they did what they had to FIX IT! I'm surprised that Spock prime would just accept the destruction of his home world. “The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.” Remember that? Except in this case both the many and the few have lost. Kirk lost his father; Spock lost his mother and his home world. There are only 10,000 Vulcan’s left. Granted if you hate Vulcan’s you may not mind the Vulcan genocide, but I DO! My main complaint with the plot, separate from my gripes about the tech and visuals, is that the villain won. Yes, Nero was killed but he Destroyed Vulcan and in my mind he won. The villain should never win, and the heroes should never just roll over and let him. They had better make a sequel and do what they did in Star Trek III after Spock died, They FIXED IT! And in Star Trek IV after the ENTERPRISE was destroyed, they FIXED IT! Spock prime had better get to the Guardian of Forever or something and do just that. FIX IT!

#2 - Um, dude, if everybody now knows the planet will be destroyed 150 years in the future, don't you think they may actually have enough TIME TO SAVE IT?

#1 - And of course, why would you ever see aliens or strange monsters in a SPACE MOVIE? They should all look just like humans but with slight facial blemishes and different colored skin. That is much more interesting and realistic.

What a bunch of dumb comments.

To: SkyFy

I have seen several films last year and this year, in theaters, and most were lousy experiences, back to back. Last year, for me, only Cadillac Records and Benjamin Buttons were worth my 10 dollar trickets price and the 24 dollars at the snack bar, each time. As for this year's crop of films, so far, Fast And The Furious was barely okay, but it was fun at times, Obsessed was worse, Wolverine...was worse still, and the new Star Trek is just the bottom of the barrel? I just figure, in respect to Star Trek, with a 130 to 150 million dollar budget, at least, that is what the studio is claiming, for a movie that looks like 65 million, or less...that somebody would have stopped along the way and said..."Hey, we need a better script???!!!!! And while we are at it, let's hire Matt Damon to really give this film some major acting traction and credibility" This film is missng that. It just seemed the execs said to themselves we need the young demographic, and we will hire a bunch of young pretty faces to do just that...and that became more important than delivering a good story, and or, good motives for the characters' actions? This is literally the High School The Musical version of Star Trek.

In regard to my bad film going experiences, my anger is with the industry...as I feel burned as a consumer. These days, vaguely passable films are being lauded as great films, like this new Star Trek...and it just puzzles me as to were people's brains have gone? I heard on the radio yesterday that this is the generation where the "Crack Babies" have finally grown-up and they are now teens and 20 something adults...and I just find it rather scary and jarring that this generation is not as smart, seemingly, as those that came before it...and I guess it is my first actual realization that the Crack Baby generation is now in a position where they will be running things soon...but what is so frightening about this is...that these people are so easily duped by sub par entertainment that is sold to them? And if they can be so easily duped by things like this poorly drafted movie, and others like it, what will come of the world when they really do become in charge of it...and they are asked to examine something of real importance that our lives will depend on them getting their response right? If they can't even recognize a good or bad movie when they see it, how the hell are they going to deal with things like world politics, war, health issues, environmental matters, and economics?

Sometimes it is not just about entertainment...sometimes what you deem as entertainment becomes a barometer of one's culture...and self. And if you can measure IQ by people's seeming overwhelmingly positive reaction to such a terrible film, and those like it, then we are truly in a world of trouble!

blondetrekgirl,

heraldtribune.com/article/20090430/ARTICLE/904301025/

"Nichelle Nichols, the original Uhura, also suggested playing Uhura's grandmother in the new film, but Abrams could not write this in due to last year's Writers Guild strike." - Steve Echeverria Jr., HERALD TRIBUNE

You also might find this enlightening:

digitalcontentproducer.com/cameras/revfeat/star_trek_abrams_0420/index.html

12) If you're going to go back into the Academy years, and/or go to Delta Vega...where the Hell is Gary Mitchell? Mitchell was Kirk's best buddy from his Academy years, and eventually ended up stranded on Delta Vega in "Where No Man Has Gone Before" (the second Original Series pilot, broadcast in 1966). Granted, it's not as big a leap against Canon as making Kirk the Captain of the Enterprise right out of the Academy (TOS posited he served on several other vessels first), and/or having Pike promoted to Admiral after his very first adventure on the Enterprise (completely skipping over the events of "The Cage" and "The Menagerie"...one blink for yes, and all that), but Mitchell was Kirk's best pal before Spock. At least a CAMEO would have been nice.

I know: Fanboys! Ugh!!

John Locke said "#2 - Um, dude, if everybody now knows the planet will be destroyed 150 years in the future, don't you think they may actually have enough TIME TO SAVE IT?"

Actually, no. It's a matter a celestial mechanics. Now that the star is 150 years off from the position in the galaxy where in the future it will be aimed at Romulus there are more options than that which Spock chose.

For one, Soran's artificial supernova missile. Blow it now, in the past, and it becomes just another supernova in the galaxy whose residue goes whizzing harmlessly along in the empty space between life bearing stellar systems and might even seed the start of one.

That's assuming that we buy the preposterous notion that a supernova could propagate its effects to the Romulus star system at warp speeds faster than the speed of their detection technology.

BTW some have suggested it was the Romulus system's star that went supernova. But that system has two habitable and settled planets: Romulus and Remus. How the *bleep* could a supernova of the parent star take out Romulus but NOT Remus? And Spock's "cure" seems to create a singularity that evaporates. How would that be helpful to the Romulans? They'd just be trading one disaster for another.

Of course, it is a total mystery to me why Spock Prime
didn't just resort to David Marcus' Genesis torpedo? Sure, the resultant star system may have been unstable but at least the star he programmed-in would have been too small to go supernova.

What I want to know is why neither Vulcan or Earth have small atmospheric fighters that could have just blown up the drill or its tether? Or for that matter planetery based photon torpedos or phaser banks.

"You misinterpret what I meant, I wasn't saying that they HAD indeed succeeded in alienating all the first viewers only that Abrams, et al, said in interviews they thought that it was ok to RISK alienating them all, because this movie was aimed at a different "broader" audience."

sorry about that.

i have noticed a few people talking about joss whedon and his film, serenity, and comparing it to star trek. i just checked rotten tomatoes, and from a statistical perspective, the new star trek is exceeding serenity in positive reviews - 96% to 81%.

i have yet to see serenity, so i cannot speak as to whether or not it is a decent film, but i have seen other projects from joss whedon; from the good: buffy the vampire slayer, to the horrendous: alien resurrection and dollhouse.

back to the topic:

"BTW some have suggested it was the Romulus system's star that went supernova. But that system has two habitable and settled planets: Romulus and Remus. How the *bleep* could a supernova of the parent star take out Romulus but NOT Remus?"

it must be the romulan star that went supernova...otherwise, it would make zero sense. and the status of remus was never mentioned - most likely because the writers assumed we would know it was destroyed too. but it would have been nice for them to mention it as well, especially for the uninitiated.

As a movie, I thought it was great fun; I'm already planning on seeing it again. That said, as a Star Trek movie, I was really bothered by a number of WTF moments, most of which were unnecessary or could have been corrected if the powers that be had cared to bother.

I'm an engineer with a strong scientific and technical background and, while ST has often played fast and loose in the realm of technobabble, they've at least made an effort of stay on the unexplained side of stuff we don't have really understand (yet) . It's one thing to to take an obscure theory from abstract physics and use it as a plot device; it's quite another to throw established science out the window completely in favor of "space opera" rather than "science" fiction. One of the things that has appealed to me about the star trek franchise since I got to stay up on Thursday nights to watch the original series on NBC, was that it (far more often than not) presented a _plausible_ future. For example, when The Enterprise first encountered a black hole on screen in the original series they referred to it as a "black sun" (an allusion to John Michell's 1793 letter to the Royal Society suggesting the theory of a star so massive that even light couldn't escape it's gravitation force) They didn't get the term wrong, John Wheeler just hadn't coined the term "black hole" yet but the concepts were right.

From a physics standpoint, the movie is a huge disappointment, and the sad part is, it didn't have to be. There are literally thousands of Trekkie physicists who would had volunteered to doctor the script to let them do all the things they needed for the plot (natural disaster taking out a planet, time travel, drilling into a planet from high orbit, etc) with far more plausible (or at least less dead wrong) explanations than what the writer's cooked up the film.

Aside from the physics issues, my next complaint is just all the little things that utterly defy common sense. For example: if "red matter" is so powerful and so unstable that a teardrop-sized sample can create a singularity that will consume an expanding supernova that is threatening the entire galaxy (see grip above re: physics) then why make a giant supply of the stuff? Did the the makers of red matter give them a discount for buying in bulk? Did they anticipate needing to make 2000 or so other super-massive black holes? Moreover, if you make a blunder like producing three orders of magnitude more red matter than you would have needed for the actual task at had, why would the film makers call attention to this fact by having the kids in the vulcan academy scene repeatedly reciting the formula for the volume of a sphere?

My final beef (related to their # 9 above, the engine room) is with the set design for the ship interiors. The bridge was beautiful but everything else was just so unrealistic as to destroy suspension of disbelief. Half the sets LOOKED like sets, more over they looked like incomplete sets, lots of props, catwalks and miscellaneous junk piled into a soundstage with high ceilings and lots of open spaces. It made me think that I was looking at a warehouse full of junk, not the flagship of the federation. Sure the water reclamation plant was deliberately overdone for comic effect, but the engine room was a pathetic example of a designer not only forgetting about centuries of advancing technologies between now the then, but also ignoring everything that been done in human factors in the past fifty years. WWII air craft carriers had more practical designs.

The Romulan mining ship was a disaster inside and out. I can understand trying to make something visually interesting for cinematic purposes, but there was no sense of form, function, or logic. It was just a comic book fantasy rendered on screen with no sense of how or why people with a real job to do would ever build something like that.

As I said I LIKED the film, I'm willing to buy into the alternate time line, I might even forgive the "poof - we've decided that instead of throwing you out of the academy you're junior year, we'll make you captain of the flagship and gloss over everyone else in the chain of command who's fully trained, experiences and has genuinely _earned_ a promotion," but there were really a LOT of things that seriously detracted from the film that would have been easy to fix if they'd bothered to try.

(13) I REALLY HATED Kirk's "final solution" to the Kobayashi Maru. Even a first year cadet, let alone Spock, who wrote the sim, would have seen it as the crude software hack it was. And Kirk's attitude during the whole thing was shameful. In ST-2 Kirk claimed he "reprogrammed the simulation, so it would be possible to save the ship." OK, fine. I would have, however, expected something a BIT more clever than all five Klingon vessels just "forgetting" to raise their shields as they're already in attack mode.

I would have preferred something far more subtle, like a back-door hack into the Klingon's systems, causing them to re-cloak (and automatically lower shields), akin to what happened in Generations. A very subtle hack, leaving Spock actually questioning his programming skills for awhile. (Until, of course he finally figures it out, and begins to see there's more to young Kirk than meets the eye.).

But that scene was a huge disappointment.

Why wouldn't Nero save Romulus? Because he was insane with vengence. Isn't it hypothetically possible that Nero would have gone through with Spock's plan to save Romulus AFTER he fed his bloodlust?

Well, I must be a masochist. Because I have read complete thread.
First, I would like to remind you about my post from 9:53 AM ON 05/09/09.

Second, I'd like to think radical: If this is alternative timeline, why at all have Sulu? Or Uhura? Or Čehov? Or Checkov? Or anyone else?
You see, I have seen ST long time ago when TV sets were still B/W. Seen all TV series: TOS, TAS, TNG, DS9, VOY, ENT. Seen all movies so far.
Still, I don't understand... why keep ALL original characters? This is different timeline! We have seen some interesting aliens before boarding of the 1701. So where are they in the movie? Not good enough to finish Academy? Why are they accepted then at all?

And no, I don't want to compare ST with Firefly/Serenity, Farscape and/or Babylon 5!

Conclusion: Go and see the movie. And have fun, as much as you can have it.

By Son of a Maui Portagee at 1:36 AM ON 05/10/09
"But that's just it, even going with your own estimations of this film, they spent over $150 mil and the BEST they could come up with is 3rd place? How does that add up to the promised Moses Trek?"

I think blowing away 7 previous movies and 2 series (Voyager and Enterprise) is a pretty go ROI. Of course Lost in Space could beat Voyager, but that is another story. Moses Trek? WTF does that mean? Given the likelihood they could have created a disaster, I'm thirlled with what they did.

"As for ST III, didn't each and every Kirk (literal) cliff-hanging scene in this new movie pay homage to that? I swear I heard (not literally) an echo of Shatner's "I (pause) have had (pause) enough (pause) of YOU!" after the Narada refused assistance in the final battle scene."

To each, his own. I didn't take any of those scenes as having anything to do with ST3. In fact, one of the things that impressed me the most was this film didn't treat every secondary character as a buffoon like they did in ST3.

Changes that could have helped:

don't blow up Vulcan, blow up a Vulcan colony planet (Nero wants to "test" the weapon before going to Vulcan and having to fight through it's defenses.

Drop the entire scene with boy kirk and the corvette. It had no purpose.

Drop Old Spock. Instead of the ice plane scenes we have new Spock drop Kirk off with Scotty since Kirk wasn't suppose to be on the ship anyway. Kirk convinces Scotty to help him and they beam back before Entrprise leaves.

By not blowing up Vulcan earlier, they final battle takes place at Vulcan and not Earth. Vulcan thus survives.

Have the scene where Kirk becomes captain with a tag saying "3 years later". Commentary changed to something like "in addition to your previous awards, here is a new one" [ that corresponds to something Kirk got in the old series - See "Court Marshal". Thus we don't have a raw cadet being promoted and we still have Kirk doing a tour on the Farragut.

So, in summary, there were ways to make it easier for the most die-hard fans to stomach without making many changes at all. Having said all this, I don't mind Vulcan being zapped...I think it can lead to more plot ideas later.

My one regret...this is a movie and not a new series on TV. Waiting another 2 years for the next movie will be hard.

Good Movie...and thank you J.J. for bringing back the awesome starfleet mini skirts!

KirkIsJustPine,

The whole supposed reason, as expressed in cries of "REBOOT! REIMAGINE!", for this Trek to be is to lead the people from the supposedly stale old vast wasteland of Trek to the promise land of a better Trek than had ever gone before, i.e. Moses Trek.

$150 mil and only third place? Would not that tend to lead to the conclusion that we would have been better-off if Paramount had taken the $150 mil and simply modernized the fx of TWoK as was teased in the Austin premier or a new TV series as you suggest? Actually, with that kind of money they could have done both.

Thought the film was good but hated the alternate timeline gimmick wiping out of vulcan ! ridiculous. Thought quinto was pretty average as spock but liked pine and especially urban as mc coy. The fx were all over the place and the camera just never stood still !

It was good but it ranks behind the warth of khan and first contact for me.

"The fx were all over the place and the camera just never stood still !"

agreed. there were times when i found it hard to keep up with the action in the space scenes - starships zipping around and firing from multiple weapons ports. those moments were the antithesis of those from the wrath of khan, which i am fine with...just slow them down a bit.

Seriously? THESE were the top 11? Most of them are easily dismissed. There were MUCH bigger WTF moments around physics and time travel.

Even so, this was a universe that involves the physically impossible transporters. Let's all just suspend disbelief and cut it some slack. Better yet, lets focus on what this film excelled at -- the character interactions! The characters were great and a lot of fun to watch!

Seriously, if you have this many problems with a movie like this, just stop watching sci fi's altogether.. they're science FICTION for a reason.

Re: #4: I was willing to assume the somewhat 'elastic' nature of time meant that dropping Kirk's escape pod so close to Spock was the timeline's way of trying to get the universe back on track (as it was in the pre-Nero timeline).

For point 7 - Who says Uhuru didn't report it? They were still at the Academy at that point; she was in class. This was well before anyone knew that Vulcan was under attack. And since the emergency reports were that Vulcan was experiencing a natural disaster, why WOULD she then go tell the captain that a Romulan vessel had attacked Klingon ships?

I just have one question: WHAT THE HELL IS RED MATTER?

Yea, whatever. Stop whining. I love ST, and this is the best movie yet. It's not like the previous movies did not have plot holes. Not to mention that most of your points either have obvious answers or are just due to you not paying attention.

Oh please. All 11 of these complaints are SO trivial, that it makes me wonder if you were even interested in enjoying the movie in the first place, or if you showed up hoping it would suck. Get over yourselves, sit down, and enjoy a fun movie.

Hated it.

Too many tweaks to the universe.

I'm really tired of the super powerful alien device from the future plot device.

@AngelosDracul: "Uhura and Spock: HEY! Didn't Star Trek set a new "thing" by having KIRK and Uhura kiss? I think so. Chalk ANOTHER ONE up for the "alternate time line"."

Yes, an alternate timeline in which we don't have 1) the same level of taboo on interracial relationships as in the 1960s and 2) Kirk is not played by an egomaniac who can't stand anyone else getting the spotlight.

The t kiss in Plati's Stepchildren was planned as SPOCK/Uhura kiss in the original script - which made sense since they had flirted in early season 1, there was a bit of backstory for them in Roddenberry's notes and their friendship/attraction was supposed to be played up more, but the network didn't want anything resembling a relationship between a black woman and someone played by a white actor. They also constantly asked for Uhura's role in the show to be minimized.

Roddenberry still wanted to somehow get an interracial kiss in the show and break new ground, so he came up with the Plato's Stepchildren idea. A kiss forced by telekinesis and against the characters' will - does't seem that brave now, but most likely it was the only way to get it past the censors.

But William Shatner pulled rank and insisted that, if anyone is going to be kissing Nichelle (read: getting all the publicity for the "first interracial kiss"), it was going to be him, "the star of the show". So they eventually changed it to Kirk/Uhura, while Spock kissed Chapel.

One of my favourite things about this movie is that it finally sets some old injustices right. :)

shayd , I couldn't agree more.

And I'm sorry bdp, but you have the emphasis wrong. It's SCIENCE fiction and that's what distinguishes it from FANTASY fiction, MAGIC fiction and Space Opera..

Elim Garak,

But that's just it. The whole supposed purpose of of this reboot is to leave stale old Trek behind. What use is it if it is just like old Trek - plot holes and all? $150 mil for the same old same old with great characterizations that was always a part of Trek? Except for the budget what exactly was extraordinarily better than the best of what went before?

Has anyone considered that ST 2009 is our universe's version and ST:OS from a mirror universe?

What is with everyone bashing ENT as compared to this film? I mean really, ENT in my opinion was a truer realization of Roddenberry’s dream than this movie, with the exception of the whole Xindi thing. And despite the gripes about it I feel they were minor compared to what J.J. has done to this.
And no, I did not want to hate this movie, I really wanted to love it. That’s why my disappointment was so profound. As others have stated, it would not have taken a whole lot to make this movie acceptable. Perhaps they could re-cut the movie on DVD and make it work. I don’t know, I’m just so disheartened at the whole thing

Star Trek (2009)

Elim Garak,

But that's just it. The whole supposed purpose of of this reboot is to leave stale old Trek storytelling problems behind. What use is spending all that much more money if it is just like old Trek - plot holes and all? $150 mil for the same old same old with great characterizations? Wasn't that was always a part of Trek? Except for the budget what exactly was extraordinarily better than the best of what went before?

@David Alexander McDonald

Hey, don't bust on The FInal Frontier.. it gave us my favorite Star Trek quote of all time (What does God need with a starship)

That said, I liked the new movie, Simon Pegg and Karl Urban steal the movie. It is huge, it is pretty and to quote Mal, Oh so shiny. It is however, and alternate time line (ala Mirror Universe) of the original world, so any changes to canon are fine with me.

just my 2 credits...

"Except for the budget what exactly was extraordinarily better than the best of what went before?"

Action for one. When was the last time we saw some real action in Trek. Not just cops and robbers gun play, but hand to hand flips, kicks and...you know action.

Another? The old uniforms! I missed those.

Look, it wasn't your $150m, so why complain? We got a new Trek movie that has a ton of energy and a committed sequel to follow.

Part of Trek was exploring where no one has gone before. Well, we have a new universe where Trek hasn't gone before and I for one am excited by that.

lkcroff,

I once made an exaggerated joke to point out that in the Hollywood of today these things are never done - in response to cries that we shouldn't judge these works until they are finished.

I'm with you. I'm willing to bet that there'll be a different slightly more polished cut on the disc, as Bay did with RATATOUILLE. I'm not going to waste any more time at the theater. I'm waiting for the disc or maybe the F/X exclusive.

All I have to say is you bring up a lot of interesting points. Especially #1 (Remember the random polar bear on Lost??) But...

#2) During those 25 years, didn't Nero not realize what the star date was? Like, he didn't know he had travelled into the future. I only bring this up because when he was interrogating Captain Pike, Pike looked at him and said something along the lines of, "Do you know what star date it is?" and Nero just went crazy on him? Maybe I'm remembering it wrong. I'll be seeing it again soon.

#8) Nero is pissed off-- of course he's going to pimp his ride with lazers. He's a senile little alien.

Here's another one or two: This drilling platform is obviously still in the upper atmosphere, WAY above the surface. So why would Sulu and Kirk take their helmets off? How do they breathe?

Wouldn't it be more believable that the Narada blocks transporters and comm, rather than the drill?

I'm one of the few in the world that did not like the film. Not saying it was a bad film, but I just didn't like it. After all the great reviews I had heard and read I was prepared to be surprised and enjoy the film. Sadly this wasn't the case.
I agree with the WTF moments listed, especially the engine room. Films have done similar things in the past and been made fun of for it. Seemed very "Metropolis" like to me. Fancy, clean, crisp Apple store decor above, and steel and concrete below.
That and I can't believe a entire crew would just "hide" for 25 years when they are sitting on the most advanced ship in the galaxy.

So - my 2 bits

First, I don't pay any attention to who directs what unless something hammers it into me like Spielberg and Lucas are responsible for SW and Indie, but as who directs and who produces..I always get mixed up. (Although somewhere, for some reason, I developed a passionate despisal for Christopher Columbus), so the fact that JJ Abrams directed the thing means absolutely nothing to me in either direction.

Second, I watched the original Trek as part of my young adulthood. I worked the original Trek conventions and I knew a number of the original cast and crew. Loved them, loved the show.

But, I am not going to wrap TOS up in shiny paper and proclaim it perfect. Actually for a 3 season series, an awful lot of it was pure drek. BUT, at the heart of it was the feeling of camaraderie and hope. It was a product of its time and so has been every series and movie since. They were each and every one influenced by our real world politics, culture and global situation as well as trying to take some of the hope and vision that Gene Roddenberry tried to give us.

I saw ST and I adored it. Yes, there were holes and a lot of valid commentary has been made about them, but there were a lot of statements made about stuff that if one had actually...oh...PAID ATTENTION to the movie were just silly.

Spock & Uhura. Very very clearly, they had already developed their relationship back when he was an instructor and she was a cadet at the Academy. What initiated it, who knows? But, between natural Vulcan reticense and, I would imagine, Star Fleet regulations it was not known. She followed him after his mother's death because she knew him well enough to know that he would need some kind of solace. By the transporter pad kiss, he had lost Vulcan, he had fully acknowledged his human side and his father had admitted to loving his mother. If that's not a good enough reason to kiss the woman you love when you might never see her again, I don't know what is.

Cadets/Kirk's Promotion - This was the Enterprise's shakedown cruise and quite possibly would have been a cadet training mission even if all the experienced personnel had not been emergency deployed on other ships in the Laurentian System. While Pike clearly would have been familiar with the other cadets, he clearly had taken a special interest in Kirk over the past 3ish years and so probably was aware of his potential and capabilities better than the others, except Spock of course. This is why he made Spock captain and Kirk First Officer. As someone pointed out, he then sent Kirk on a potential suicide mission where if he survived, it would have proven Pike's point. If he didn't Spock could pick someone else.

Earth Defense System - Nero tortured the defense shield codes out of PIke.

Shooting down the Drill - (This is my own hypothesis) - It was shielded against weapons fire. Sulu & Kirk & the dead redshirt would have been inside the shields once they landed on the platform. And, one assumes that inferior weapons of the present would have been incapable of penetrating it, but Spock's future weapons would have stood a chance.

Core jettison - Just because TrekClassic had a single core system, whose to say that Trek09's core was not an array-based system and that jettisoning the core would not involve multiple pods.

Coats (& firewood) on Delta Vega - Nero dumped Spock on poor wandering Delta Vega so that he could see the destruction of Vulcan. One presumes that he would like Spock actually alive to see this and would send him down with the necessities to remain so. Kirk got his coat out of the kit that came down in the pod with him.

blondetrekgirl - The transwarp beam landed Scotty a couple feet to the left of ideal and that's how he wound up in the gerbil tube (I have no argument with a tubing system to process the water on the ship, but that IS what it looked like to me too).

And, lastly, I am firmly convinced that Uber Critic and blondetrekgirl are the same writer.

The only response to your 11 points: So?
It's a MOVIE. It's HOLLYWOOD. Get over it, move out of Mom's basement, and get a life. Things won't seem so constantly dour then.

How about the fact that we can transport people across systems (from Saturn to Earth) or to space ships that have been speeding away from your planet at warp speed for hours but we have to get mother and all the Vulcan elders out of the cave before we can transport them to a ship currently in orbit...WTF? The transporters were overused in this film.

Why is it that those of us that did not care for the film have to defend our not liking it?
I am not trying to change anyone's mind. I'm thrilled that so many people liked it. It means Trek will be around for years to come!
I welcome all into the Trek fan universe! Celebrate and accept our differences.
Isn't that what Trek is all about?

Christopher -

I tend to agree with you. I think the problem ;ies with the people who have elevated Gene Roddenberry almost to godhood and have invented a canon (hey, y'all, note the spelling) around what was, at heart, a TV show that was fortunate to make it to season 3. That it touched people and became what it did is great.

But, it frightens me, the depth to which a few people have taken the series to heart. Their attitudes towards the people who have made the changes and the people who either like or are open-minded about them is truly disturbing and definitely at odds with IDIC.

When you consider the fact that the throngs of Trekkies (or Trekkers) weren't in great enough numbers to keep "Enterprise" from cancellation or keep "Nemesis" from bombing - both of which led to Trek's downfall and the inevitable need for a reboot - you gotta wonder why all the effort to make them happy?

For those of you too young to remember, look up 'red mercury.' Probably where the 'red matter' dubious plot device came from.

@Karina Wright

I have to admit that I am a fan of the original series as well as TNG & ENT and that may play some small part of my not caring for the film, but I certainly agree that ther is always room for fresh ideas.

BTW, you and everyone else, love or hate is welcome to stop by my site.

www.jonja.net

Isn't a alternate (parallel) universe, "Where no one has gone before."?

Yes dear. Some people are soooooooooooo 3 dimensional. They would probably complain if they ever found out that we could actually go into the future and consult with Doc brown about the time space to be continued crap.

You guys have missed the big major no-no of the entire movie! How about the fact that the Romulans home planet was destroyed! Um, hello!!! The Romulans home planet was alive in kicking in the Next Generation, DS9, and Voyager...so WTF! There was never a mention of their planet going bang in the series and should have been if Spock failed to stop the destruction of it! But no, we had the Romulans in the next Gen and they even visited it often. Huge plot flaw for me.

Mom, said "Isn't a alternate (parallel) universe, "Where no one has gone before."?"

Not if it's populated by alternate people. Now if Spock Prime went to a universe that didn't have people, then you'd be onto something.

@LdyHeat

I think we are to assume that the destruction of the world took place after the events we had seen in TNG, VOY, DS9, and subsequent movies.
Spock is VERY old.

Look, my 3 cents. Let's separate fantasy from reality, literally.
Nimoy is almost 80, and it's nice to get a paycheck and some attention. What does he care... he almost out. This Star Trek film was made by a guy who has stated he likes Star Wars not Star Trek. This film is no more than a SATIRE of Star Trek. C'mon . I've heard people ask why they used the song Sabotage by The Beastie Boys. Reason: Sabotage is making fun of how Shatner says sabotage. Look on Youtube, you'll find a video about it. Did you know that? Red matter is just making fun of Star Trek plot device. Wicktor wicktor is just making fun of the forced Russian accent. Even the first ship to show up on screen is ridiculous... no nacelles and well it just looks ridiculous. This whole movie, from how the phasers react on its targets to the shiny Galaxy Quest like appearance... this whole movie says JJ Abhrams hates Trek. The poster above has a really excellent point that I didn't know. This whole reboot is to deny profit sharing from ideas that exits. Bravo, I can believe that, it makes sense in the real world. This movie is really an abomination. It's the equivalent to making Titanic a submarine and altering it from there until is not recognizable. Vulcans mate every 7 years. This movie ignores the identity of the characters of this story because it is really a satire by a guy who doesn't like his subject.

Nope, sorry Christopher, it clearly states in the Star Trek film that Romulus blew up 128 years after his voyages with Kirk. It couldn't possibly be after TNG or DS9. Star Dates are all wrong. Go back and watch the movie and you will see what I'm talking about.

Nope, sorry Christopher, it clearly states in the Star Trek film that Romulus blew up 128 years after his voyages with Kirk. It couldn't possibly be after TNG or DS9. Star Dates are all wrong. Go back and watch the movie and you will see what I'm talking about.

"Even if it's warp speed and Klingons, there has to be an authenticity. Otherwise it means nothing." - Tom Hanks

Amend that to:

"Even if it's warp speed and Klingons, there has to be a logic and an authenticity. Otherwise it means nothing." - Tom Hanks

Karina Wright: I've never previously heard of or met Uber Critic but admire his thought processes. Hard to find people in the "Trek Universe" that aren't starkers or sex-less MIT grads, but rather just pragmatic normal voting public who have a simple wish: a movie with decent writing, great characters, nifty effects and, um, throw in that whole world peace thing for grins!

I've read a few posts here that are basically "Get a Life" posts. Past just being mean spirited...there are a lot of people on this board, such as myself, who actually do have a life. My main beef is that I spent $12.95 to watch a movie that can't stand up to the scrutiny of common sense. A movie that stretches the bounds of common sense so much that it can't be ignored. The director of this film did everything but put a unicorn on the bridge and ask me to sustain a suspension of disbelief. Don't ask me to spend my money on a movie that can't stand the test of basic logic and common sense. I don't make the millions they do so that I can waste money on entertainment. Minimum wage here is $8.80.....they can spend that much to get some Trek fan to go over the script and fix it for them. When I don't even have to go out of my way to poke holes in a plot, there's a deep deep problem. I'm not a Trek fan per se, but do see a lot of good things about the franchise. There is no reason why these folks here can't ask for quality in the movie they wanted to see. Trek doesn't have to be perfect, but it shouldn't be ridiculous.

You are my hero Gail. Well said!

I didn't like the ship, The music was lame, The engine room looks like a beer distillerary,
Female uniform dresses were too long, Spock and Uhura in love doesn't work for me, Vulcan destroyed Spocks mom dead that all sucks

Hi blondtrekgirl: Thanks...had to call Star Trek BS on this one. I've seen a lot of B movies with better plot logistics than this. As the tag for the X-Files goes: I Want to Believe....but the director needs to give me something to work with. Just because it has Star Trek on it shouldn't mean we have to lower our IQ's to enjoy it.

I reread the last line of my last post and felt that it could be misconstrued...I apologize if it gave a meaning that I didn't intend. It should have read something like this:

Just because Star Trek has a fan base of millions already, doesn't mean the movie has to be less than a quality production.

That is what I meant..sorry guys!

I have to disagree with point 10. Letting Willy Wonka design the engine room. I thought the engine room was much better done. My problem is that Valcun and Earth had no plant defends systems. Seem like defending your home planet would be important. But its a movie try not to think about it to much

Nero explained #2 himself during the movie. He wanted to destroy the Federation and build an Empire the likes that the galaxy has ever seen.

'm tired of hearing people say if Trek fans didn't stop watching Enterprise or had gone to see Nemesis, then a reboot would not have been necessary.

Should fans of any franchise accept everything that is part of that franchise regardless of its quality? That's being a fan of product and volume of product rather than story and heart. I'd rather let a franchise die that have it be subpar or miss the elements that made it appealing in the first place.

kuratowa,

I agree. Tom Hanks had it right there has to be a logic and an authenticity otherwise it means nothing.

I still think that like MIRROR, MIRROR or ASSIGNMENT: EARTH it is definitely a part of Trek. But it ultimately isn't about Trek. It's not authentic Star Trek.

I does serve me in that it proves I was right in my long standing fan arguments where I contended that the characters and their characterizations did not and were not inexplicably tied to the original cast. I think this cast is capable of delivering authentic Trek - I just despair that the suits will ever get it.

Abrams does an excellent Star Wars but I have no hope that any better Trek will result as he's sticking to the same writers.

TxSciFiFan,

When one engages in any contest there's a chance of losing. What would Nero gain by decimating the Federation dying in one of those battles and then 100 and some odd years later the Empire loses its home planet and seat in a supernova again? Not to mention Spock Prime claimed it threatened the whole galaxy?

I'm not sure the movie made this clear but the implication was that Spock Prime was the only one who recognized the threat?

I mean to sit around for 25 years in the hopes that the one Spock Prime that was responsible would pop on through when so many things seem to be against your favor in that.

It's a miracle that Spock Prime was able to show up in that alternate timeline at all - especially after Nero altered it with his Kelvin kill which one would think would make it pretty hard for Spock Prime to hit.

It was a really GOOD movie. Not GREAT, I think, but highly enjoyable even though some of the plot-points noted above [see the movie first BEFORE reading] detracted from the enjoyment of the actual story. Slightly.

I would like to say that if you got a oil ship of today gave it a bunch of torpedo's and pit it in battle against a 1900 battle ship who would win?? now with technology we evolve like 5X faster so it is very probable that a mining ship could kill and destroy a armada.

Dugger obviously you fail to realize it's an alternate reality. Seriously hardcore Trekkies are some of the most anally retentive nerds out there. "OH MY GOD THIS ISN'T EXACTLY LIKE ALL OTHER STAR TREKS BEFORE IN EVERY SINGLE WAY"(because we all know how well the last few movies attracted new fans)
Seriously, it's a damn movie, don't spoil your Captain Kirk uniforms over it.

This was a seriously awful Star Trek movie; it was an ok action movie-- as long as you leave your brains at home. By rebooting the future as it were, JJ admits he doesn't have the grace of Roddenberry or the imagination of Coons. I bet the ST creators are spinning in their graves. Yeah, right. Destroy Vulcan. That's a good idea. Then dish up the weakiest science this side of the Death Star to explain it all. Terrible.

all of these complaints are lame and most of them not thought through well. the hand thing, well, whatever, but it was funny with Bones repeatedly stabbing him with the hypo. the jetteson i think was to show how spock was already getting illogical. when he gets out of the pod he starts a personal log and sites a code he belives has been broken in the action of jettesioning him. of course he landed next to the facility, he wasn't sent there to die just get him out of the way. even if the crew didn't set a destination for the pod it's autopilot would have landed it close to the facility were he could be recovered. when he wakes up the pod tells him it landed near the facility so it obviously knew it was there. the drill makes sense, it casues a lot of radiation. how many episodes have there been that they couldn't beem becacuse of bad electrical storms in a planets atmosphere. i think a beam of energy that huge would make a lot more disturbance than a heavy storm. the drill itself makes sense too. similar idea to a space elevator. you have a satilite in geosyncro orbit and drop down a teather to a ground station. in this case you don't even have to connect to the ground. if spock had been happy that would have been super lame and a total destruction of his charater. his charater is young and hasn't learned to deal with emotions yet and the first one that always comes through anger not happiness. lets not forget that the reason that vulcans are so logical is due to the fact that they were forced to turn to logic when they almost destryed themselves in civil war. the repress there emotions because they have significantly more violent emotions then the klingons. as for the uhura thing, i don't think she was supposed to be listening then. i could be mistaken on this one but i thought that she said something to that effect when she first mentioned hearing it. the engine room, okay that was kind wierd but acutually makes more sense then a traditional star trek engine room. since they use dilithium, which is a fuel that can be used in a fusion reaction, it kinda makes sense that it looks kinda like a nucular power plant. thats not saying i liked the choice though. i normally don't bother posting on someting like this but i was so depressed by the lack of insigt in this article that i had to. If they came out and said hey look this is exactly the reason behind this happening, it would be increadibly lame and no one would want to watch it. If you can't read between the lines sometimes your going to be repeatedly disapointed at the movie theater. a lot of the fun is figuring it out for your self. As an up and coming filmmaker myself i hate it when movies overexplain things and treat their audience like idiots. there are plenty of mindless movies out there that do just that and they are not worth the film they're printed on. when i make films i don't dumb them down for other people. if you don't understand it, to bad, don't see my movie.

Put into an escape pod and...what? It was obvious that there was no rescue coming for Kirk, as we all see Scotty just sitting on his butt at the station completely unaware that there is anyone nearby.

Sitting there doing nothing in a Federation station while a Fed homeworld is being destroyed within sight of his very location. Any alarms sounding? Nope.

This movie was Die Hard III in space. It isn't a horrible Die Hard, but it isn't a good Star Trek.

My big problem with this movie was the leap from cadet (suspended cadet even) to captain. It is completely unbelievable in a military-type structure that you have in Starfleet. And it's not just Kirk, you've got at least Uhura and McCoy also cadets, yet manning the senior crew, plus a "17-year-old" Chekhov - is he even a cadet? If he graduated, how old was he when he was a cadet? It makes no sense in any ship, let alone on the "flagship" of the fleet. Surely they could have done the story a different way, with a different sequence that didn't require them to leap from cadets to senior officers in a single mission! That's a huge WTF! moment that ought to have stopped all the writers in their tracks - but in typical cynical Hollywood fashion (which produces so many nonsensical storylines) they probably just said f*** it. Well sorry but I thought Trek was supposed to be a bit more intelligent than that.

This movie doesn't come close to the quality of all the Trek movies that came before it. Abrams was a bad choice. I would like to see Frakes do the sequel and recast the characters too.

This movie doesn't come close to the quality of all the Trek movies that came before it. Abrams was a bad choice. I would like to see Frakes do the sequel and recast the characters too.

As a casual Trek fan, I enjoyed the movie a lot. One problem here is that if ALL of you guys are film experts and critics then why aren't all of these movies perfect? I'm sick of reading pretentious posts that say things like, "Abrams' use of lens flare really made it impossible to enjoy the movie." Come on people, either get a life or make your own "flawless" movies and stop bothering the people that just want to have a good time!

Where are the Farscape webisodes? Please dont tell me youve pulled the plug on these. With BSG gone there isnt much reason left to watch syfy.

Exactly my question! I'm serching since something like nearly six hours now and I couldn't find anything about that project. Why?
(By the way forgive my bad english writting please, it isn't my mother thongue.)

I won't go back on the question of the name... Because, well, it is only a name and in some ways, it don't affect your capacities in bed. Also I will pass under silence the fact that your new way of impersonating the syfy website is kind of confusing.

I haven't been on here since a few months, but I'm still presenting Farscape to lot of people as it is my favorite show and... Well...
As I can describe the feeling of "not needing anymore reason to live than this" I had when I heard you would offer farscape a second chance. (As you did when you gave them a decent ending) I can also compare it to my disapointement to not even finding a trace of the webisode project on your new website.

And my feelings are just as bad on this as the feelings of the news fans that are appearings each months...

So... Did you abborted the project a second time?
You know... Jhon Crichton would have aborted the Farscape 1 lunch in episode 1 season 1 and you wouldn't have as much viewer today. So it seams that you could learn from your own production and stop aborthing project that audiences are waiting for...

But, I still have some hopes concerning your reputation and situation. So why do you not answer to the question?

WHERE IS THE FARSCAPE NEWS?
WHY DO ALL FARSCAPE REFERENCES IN THE FRELLING SEARCH ENGINE IS LEADING TO USER COMMENT AND NOT NEWS?

If you did not aborted it, I suggest that you recreate the page somewhere else...
Somewhere that the fans can found, and who knows... put a visitour count on it, maybe then you would see how much we are starving to see you begining a worthy project again!
I don't ask for something big and full of flash animation, but you could at least put a news with a moya picture and a sentence that is saying : Farscape Webisode are still in thinking or someting like this...
Or if you aborted it (Bad idea...) You could at least say it!
So we would be fixed...

Respect. That is what all of this is about. It is only a question of respect regarding your consumer and fans and supporter wich by the way, as you have a paying channel, are the ones that feeds you. Did you ever thought some of us only pay you in hope that someday you would give the financing to a sequel?
I mean... I don't know how to donate each month to Rocknee S. O'banon and the crew...
But you had a project!

Imagine Syfy team... When you have given the chance to Farscape, you made the greater immagination came to life! When you came back on your decision and gave them a chance to finish the storyline decently you gave us peace, but let us starving for it...
Then you gave us hope, and now you do not even keep track of it?
If it is really your motto... Why don't try to push the limits to the last (Uncharted) frontier of immagination again?

Where the hezmana is the farscape webisode project page?