Star Trek

Ooh. Eh. Hmmm.

The first thing we have to do is decide what this is. Then we have to work out
how good a one it is.

Is it a sci-fi movie? Is this a story about a starship in an interstellar
peacekeeping federation? No. No it's not. It's an unashamed 124 minute fangasm.
This is a film made for people who like the original series. The intent seems
clear, to roll back the years, and remake the ludicrosity of the Shatner era.
We are having no truck with the TNG and subsequent series, where the
inhabitants of an interstellar cruise liner go places and be diplomatic at
people. This is phasers and fistfights.

As it goes, it's pretty successful. In that without the Star Trek marque on it,
this would all be pretty lame-ass stuff, but somehow, since it *is* Star Trek,
cheesy stupidity is part of the franchise, and they do a reasonable job of
capturing the formula - in a way that, for instance, 'Enterprise' really
didn't.

The plot is pretty standard Trek stuff; a bunch of Romulans from the future
have come back in time in order to trash the Vulcans and the Federation in
general, using their Way Superior Technology to cream the opposition. The only
notable thing about this is that in doing so they change Trek history, their
actions altering the characters at pretty formative points of their history,
thus ensuring that they can take a fresh take, rather than feel like they have
to copy.

It's also a superhero origins movie, in that it details how Kirk comes to
command the Enterprise, and assemble the classic crew. I don't think it'll come
as any great surprise to anyone that it doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

I have one real issue with the film, and that's that they don't give Kirk a
whole lot of manly heroics. He gets beat up a lot. His primary ability seems to
be to soak up a beating until someone else arrives to save his ass. He's Kirk.
He ought to be able to beat up any five guys in a fistfight, with a trademark
overhead double hand blow. Everyone else, I like. I actually *like* Chris Pine
as Kirk. I just wish they'd managed to write him succeeding by more than basic
blind luck.