I went into this movie with low expectations. "Self," I told myself before watching, "Maybe just pretend you're watching an entry in The Fast and the Furious series."
Allow me to provide some context for those of you who haven't seen any of those movies. In Furious 7, the latest installment, there is a sequence in which Dwayne Johnson quips "daddy's gotta go to work" before breaking a cast off of his arm by flexing. Then he steals a garbage truck, crashes it into an unmanned drone flying through a tunnel, pulls an enormous gatling gun off of the wrecked drone, and shoots a helicopter out of the sky.
I enjoy the Fast & Furious movies because I don't have to use my brain when I watch them. The plots are transparent and predictable, the writing uninspired, and basically the only redeeming features are the non-stop, completely nonsensical action set-pieces. That basically describes the last two "Star Trek" movies we've gotten. Which makes them pretty terrible as Star Trek movies, but passing okay as summer blockbusters. And considering Star Trek Beyond was directed by Justin Lin, the director of four of the seven Fast & Furious movies, that seemed like a reasonable expectation. After watching with those super low expectations, I've come to the following conclusion.
The 2009 Star Trek was basically a Star Trek parody. Star Trek Into Darkness was a barely half-coherent pile of badly written Star Trek fan films. Star Trek Beyond is, finally, a proper Star Trek film.
And I mean that seriously. Evidently the issue may very well have been JJ Abrams direction. Or maybe they fired the old writers. Whatever the case, I actually enjoyed the film. Not just as a summer blockbuster, but as a Star Trek film. I need to see it again, to be sure how I feel, but right now I'd rank it at least above The Motion Picture, and possibly above Nemesis. Those of you keeping track will recognize that as the upper half of the list, meaning that not only is this better than the bad Star Trek movies, it's better than at least one of the good ones. Let's chat about why I thought that.
Oh, and beware spoilers ahead.
First, something that is a staple of the Star Trek universe; the captain's log entry. In the TV shows this is used as a quick way to dump exposition. In the movies it's traditionally been a way to clue us in on how the captain is feeling without making them look emotionally unbalanced in front of their crew. Some of the best/only introspection we get for these captains comes from these log entries, and the alternative (an emotional outburst of some kind) would be distracting and uncharacteristic of the type of person who was able to reach the top of a command chain. 2009's Star Trek skipped out on log entries and decided to have Kirk and Spock argue with each other in front of the entire bridge crew. That was obnoxious. Into Darkness skipped out on log entries and gave us Kirk whining to an admiral. Which I'm sure would do a lot for him in terms of future promotions.
Beyond pretty much starts us off with a log entry that, in the finest Star Trek tradition, introduces the setting and gets us into the mind of Kirk. It starts the movie off right, with a look into the psychology of deep space travel and a micro-analysis of the human relationship to mortality. Good quality sci-fi stuff.
Second, the movie also finally gives us a peak into actual crew dynamics on the rebooted Enterprise. Where before the rest of the crew outside of the main characters was basically there for no reason beyond set dressing and cannon fodder, this go 'round they were actually, you know, sentient. Running around doing duties, having lives, hiding priceless artifacts inside their crab-heads. This makes the enormous starship actually feel like an enormous starship, helps us viewers get invested with these people, which in turn lends some emotional depth when the captain has to rescue most of the crew later on.
I also really liked the character of Jayla. She was pretty well written, and the performance was good. I appreciated her unfamiliar and alien tendencies, as well as her understanding of humanity based on the time she spent living in the Franklin. The fact that they set that up as her home of several years was important, along with her innate talent for engineering, because otherwise we would have wound up with a repeat of the "magic engineer" moment from the 2009 movie. But no, Scotty helped tie off the loose ends, but Jayla had done most of the work already. This is great sci-fi stuff, but also just good characterization stuff, which the last two movies absolutely ignored.
Third, the story is actually, well, a sci-fi story. I mean, sure, the general plot is pretty standard and predictable sci-fi, right down to the doomsday weapon (that actually seemed pretty benign there toward the end). But it was a sci-fi story, with an emphasis on normal people facing abnormal challenges and coming through on the strength of their crew dynamic and ability. Yes, there's plenty of bad science, but nothing outside the usual purview of Star Trek science. Yes they spent a lot of time on a planet instead of in space, but that's not terribly uncommon for Star Trek, and the fighting they actually did in space was very well handled.
Honestly, the whole thing was, while not amazing, pretty darn good. Right from the beginning I was impressed with how improved the whole script and story was, with a focus on taking the time to explain the crew's actions in the way good sci-fi does. Beyond that (pun absolutely intended) the shaky-cam was actually under control, the lens flares were basically gone, and the script was happily devoid of "JJ-isms." FINALLY.
Obviously it wasn't perfect, but I have nowhere near the number of complaints I've had concerning the last two films. Shall we start with the villain?
I want to say, I really like Idris Elba. He's a super talented actor who really can sell a wide range of characters. I've never seen him in a role I didn't like, and that includes the breathlessly confusing Prometheus and the enormously un-subtle Pacific Rim. Also, in case anyone has forgotten, his character from Pacific Rim was named Stacker Pentecost, proving once again that Pacific Rim is amazing.
But just because I respect and like Idris Elba does not mean I can't recognize that the villain in Star Trek Beyond was... weird. I've already mentioned the existence of the most underwhelming doomsday weapon ever. It was basically an ancient biological weapon, I guess, from a civilization thousands of years gone? Or something? Seems like the hundred years or so that Krall spent looking for this weapon would have been better spent just, I don't know, manufacturing conventional bioweapons. Or something. His plan was unnecessarily complicated, and his motives were unclear. The reveal that he was actually a former hero of the Federation named Balthazar Edison came out of nowhere and made very little actual sense, but left me somewhat conflicted because Balthazar Edison is nearly as cool a name as Stacker Pentecost.
His character was also pretty uninspired on screen, which considering what I know of Idris Elba's ability, I'm going to blame on a combination of weird writing and confusing direction. Like Charlize Theron and Eddie Redmayne before him, I won't be basing future judgements on Elba's bad villain performance.
Another one of the movie's main issues was the ending. It turned from a triumphant space battle to save millions of lives into some rather generic zero-g fisticuffs in an air-conditioning system. And yes, zero-g fisticuffs can be generic. We've seen this in other places, possibly best handled in Inception, and this fight was emotionless and derivative. By that point the stakes had also completely fallen apart, and all of the main plot holes seemed to happen after they wound up inside the space station.
This one would have been pretty easy to fix. Have the space battle. Draw it out a bit to ramp up the tension. Show the crew of the Enterprise actually defending the station instead of showing up late to the party. Have them discover their disruption frequency just in the nick of time. Then have Krall board the Franklin, Uhura figure out who he is, Kirk confront him long enough for a transporter lock, and then beam him and the bioweapon into space. That gets rid of the plot holes, the loss of tension, and the lack of flow through that final portion of the movie. It would have been a better ending all around.
Finally, I had an issue with the Enterprise itself. It was torn apart fairly early on, and while I was pretty clearly supposed to feel bad about that, I didn't. This isn't so much the fault of Justin Lin or Beyond, but rather the fault of the stupid way the last two movies were handled. Unlike the original Enterprise (which blew up in The Search for Spock) or the Enterprise D (Which crashed in Generations), I didn't have an emotional attachment to the ship. It was never properly handled in order to foster that relationship, so when it blew up, and Kirk was all melancholy and the music was all sad, it didn't feel earned. It felt contrived. So that moment totally fell flat.
Overall, though, the good outweighs the bad by a pretty solid margin, though I'll have to get back to you on where exactly this movie ranks. I liked the villain in Nemesis better, and the ending of Nemesis was stronger. But I liked the beginning of Beyond a lot more, and the acting in Beyond was (on average) stronger. Their settings were comparable, their conflicts were comparable, and their overall impact is comparable. Star Trek Beyond is a good action movie and a good Star Trek movie. Proving, JJ, that it can be done. Provided JJ and Bad Robot continue to distance themselves from the franchise, I'm optimistic concerning a possible sequel.
Assuming they don't follow through on trying to resurrect Leonard Nimoy.
 |
| It took some effort not to get excited by this poster. |
Allow me to provide some context for those of you who haven't seen any of those movies. In Furious 7, the latest installment, there is a sequence in which Dwayne Johnson quips "daddy's gotta go to work" before breaking a cast off of his arm by flexing. Then he steals a garbage truck, crashes it into an unmanned drone flying through a tunnel, pulls an enormous gatling gun off of the wrecked drone, and shoots a helicopter out of the sky.
I enjoy the Fast & Furious movies because I don't have to use my brain when I watch them. The plots are transparent and predictable, the writing uninspired, and basically the only redeeming features are the non-stop, completely nonsensical action set-pieces. That basically describes the last two "Star Trek" movies we've gotten. Which makes them pretty terrible as Star Trek movies, but passing okay as summer blockbusters. And considering Star Trek Beyond was directed by Justin Lin, the director of four of the seven Fast & Furious movies, that seemed like a reasonable expectation. After watching with those super low expectations, I've come to the following conclusion.
The 2009 Star Trek was basically a Star Trek parody. Star Trek Into Darkness was a barely half-coherent pile of badly written Star Trek fan films. Star Trek Beyond is, finally, a proper Star Trek film.
 |
| Which is funny, because they were much less willing to claim Star Trek this time around. |
And I mean that seriously. Evidently the issue may very well have been JJ Abrams direction. Or maybe they fired the old writers. Whatever the case, I actually enjoyed the film. Not just as a summer blockbuster, but as a Star Trek film. I need to see it again, to be sure how I feel, but right now I'd rank it at least above The Motion Picture, and possibly above Nemesis. Those of you keeping track will recognize that as the upper half of the list, meaning that not only is this better than the bad Star Trek movies, it's better than at least one of the good ones. Let's chat about why I thought that.
Oh, and beware spoilers ahead.
First, something that is a staple of the Star Trek universe; the captain's log entry. In the TV shows this is used as a quick way to dump exposition. In the movies it's traditionally been a way to clue us in on how the captain is feeling without making them look emotionally unbalanced in front of their crew. Some of the best/only introspection we get for these captains comes from these log entries, and the alternative (an emotional outburst of some kind) would be distracting and uncharacteristic of the type of person who was able to reach the top of a command chain. 2009's Star Trek skipped out on log entries and decided to have Kirk and Spock argue with each other in front of the entire bridge crew. That was obnoxious. Into Darkness skipped out on log entries and gave us Kirk whining to an admiral. Which I'm sure would do a lot for him in terms of future promotions.
 |
| "Hey superior officer, these are my demands. Are you impressed with me yet?" |
Beyond pretty much starts us off with a log entry that, in the finest Star Trek tradition, introduces the setting and gets us into the mind of Kirk. It starts the movie off right, with a look into the psychology of deep space travel and a micro-analysis of the human relationship to mortality. Good quality sci-fi stuff.
Second, the movie also finally gives us a peak into actual crew dynamics on the rebooted Enterprise. Where before the rest of the crew outside of the main characters was basically there for no reason beyond set dressing and cannon fodder, this go 'round they were actually, you know, sentient. Running around doing duties, having lives, hiding priceless artifacts inside their crab-heads. This makes the enormous starship actually feel like an enormous starship, helps us viewers get invested with these people, which in turn lends some emotional depth when the captain has to rescue most of the crew later on.
I also really liked the character of Jayla. She was pretty well written, and the performance was good. I appreciated her unfamiliar and alien tendencies, as well as her understanding of humanity based on the time she spent living in the Franklin. The fact that they set that up as her home of several years was important, along with her innate talent for engineering, because otherwise we would have wound up with a repeat of the "magic engineer" moment from the 2009 movie. But no, Scotty helped tie off the loose ends, but Jayla had done most of the work already. This is great sci-fi stuff, but also just good characterization stuff, which the last two movies absolutely ignored.
 |
| Best part, they don't make her strip down to her underwear at any point! |
Third, the story is actually, well, a sci-fi story. I mean, sure, the general plot is pretty standard and predictable sci-fi, right down to the doomsday weapon (that actually seemed pretty benign there toward the end). But it was a sci-fi story, with an emphasis on normal people facing abnormal challenges and coming through on the strength of their crew dynamic and ability. Yes, there's plenty of bad science, but nothing outside the usual purview of Star Trek science. Yes they spent a lot of time on a planet instead of in space, but that's not terribly uncommon for Star Trek, and the fighting they actually did in space was very well handled.
Honestly, the whole thing was, while not amazing, pretty darn good. Right from the beginning I was impressed with how improved the whole script and story was, with a focus on taking the time to explain the crew's actions in the way good sci-fi does. Beyond that (pun absolutely intended) the shaky-cam was actually under control, the lens flares were basically gone, and the script was happily devoid of "JJ-isms." FINALLY.
 |
| It's really weird that this cinematography is "restrained," but hey. No lens flare. |
Obviously it wasn't perfect, but I have nowhere near the number of complaints I've had concerning the last two films. Shall we start with the villain?
I want to say, I really like Idris Elba. He's a super talented actor who really can sell a wide range of characters. I've never seen him in a role I didn't like, and that includes the breathlessly confusing Prometheus and the enormously un-subtle Pacific Rim. Also, in case anyone has forgotten, his character from Pacific Rim was named Stacker Pentecost, proving once again that Pacific Rim is amazing.
But just because I respect and like Idris Elba does not mean I can't recognize that the villain in Star Trek Beyond was... weird. I've already mentioned the existence of the most underwhelming doomsday weapon ever. It was basically an ancient biological weapon, I guess, from a civilization thousands of years gone? Or something? Seems like the hundred years or so that Krall spent looking for this weapon would have been better spent just, I don't know, manufacturing conventional bioweapons. Or something. His plan was unnecessarily complicated, and his motives were unclear. The reveal that he was actually a former hero of the Federation named Balthazar Edison came out of nowhere and made very little actual sense, but left me somewhat conflicted because Balthazar Edison is nearly as cool a name as Stacker Pentecost.
His character was also pretty uninspired on screen, which considering what I know of Idris Elba's ability, I'm going to blame on a combination of weird writing and confusing direction. Like Charlize Theron and Eddie Redmayne before him, I won't be basing future judgements on Elba's bad villain performance.
 |
| Even though, just... blah. |
Another one of the movie's main issues was the ending. It turned from a triumphant space battle to save millions of lives into some rather generic zero-g fisticuffs in an air-conditioning system. And yes, zero-g fisticuffs can be generic. We've seen this in other places, possibly best handled in Inception, and this fight was emotionless and derivative. By that point the stakes had also completely fallen apart, and all of the main plot holes seemed to happen after they wound up inside the space station.
This one would have been pretty easy to fix. Have the space battle. Draw it out a bit to ramp up the tension. Show the crew of the Enterprise actually defending the station instead of showing up late to the party. Have them discover their disruption frequency just in the nick of time. Then have Krall board the Franklin, Uhura figure out who he is, Kirk confront him long enough for a transporter lock, and then beam him and the bioweapon into space. That gets rid of the plot holes, the loss of tension, and the lack of flow through that final portion of the movie. It would have been a better ending all around.
Finally, I had an issue with the Enterprise itself. It was torn apart fairly early on, and while I was pretty clearly supposed to feel bad about that, I didn't. This isn't so much the fault of Justin Lin or Beyond, but rather the fault of the stupid way the last two movies were handled. Unlike the original Enterprise (which blew up in The Search for Spock) or the Enterprise D (Which crashed in Generations), I didn't have an emotional attachment to the ship. It was never properly handled in order to foster that relationship, so when it blew up, and Kirk was all melancholy and the music was all sad, it didn't feel earned. It felt contrived. So that moment totally fell flat.
 |
| Oh, yeah, totally doomed. Whatev's. |
Overall, though, the good outweighs the bad by a pretty solid margin, though I'll have to get back to you on where exactly this movie ranks. I liked the villain in Nemesis better, and the ending of Nemesis was stronger. But I liked the beginning of Beyond a lot more, and the acting in Beyond was (on average) stronger. Their settings were comparable, their conflicts were comparable, and their overall impact is comparable. Star Trek Beyond is a good action movie and a good Star Trek movie. Proving, JJ, that it can be done. Provided JJ and Bad Robot continue to distance themselves from the franchise, I'm optimistic concerning a possible sequel.
Assuming they don't follow through on trying to resurrect Leonard Nimoy.
Comments
Post a Comment