Star Trek 09 review thread

[Samuel]

I don't think Nero had a choice when he was due to go back in time. In the movie, Nero and Spock's ships get sucked into the Red Matter Hole and get sent back in time, but not by choice. It wasn't a controlled experiment. Once they ended up there and Nero realized that they were in the past, that's when he decide to wait for Spock to show up and then go on a rampage.

His first bit was to wait for Spock to come back in order to kill him. Then he captured the captain of the Kelvin and realized that for sure they were in the wrong time period. Then it became "OK, once Spock gets here, we'll steal the Red Matter and blow shit up." Vulcan was the first obvious target, because he wanted to punish Spock and because as a Romulan, the natural first choice in any action, from deciding on breakfast to what CD to put on for bedtime, is something anti-Vulcan. Then Earth, because it's the capital of the Federation, and based on how people tend to use "human", "StarFleet" and "Federation" interchangably, in Nero's perspective would represent the destruction of the Federation.

So Nero's plan was hatched after he landed in the past, not as a goal of travelling to the past.

He mentioned he planned on torching every member planet- Earth was next due to convenience.

[SylasGaunt]

Also, while the fight on the drilling rig was a bit silly (like the rest of the movie, shocker) do note that both of the Romulans were packing disruptors (or whatever) that were wrestled or kicked away. At the close quarters that we saw it seemed pretty plausible.

Well the one who was fighting Sulu went for his axe before his gun, but then this is a pack of pissed off miners, not soldiers.

The one Kirk went after though did get disarmed, and Kirk went for his phaser right after doing so.. which then got knocked away.

Not entirely the same; remember that Kirk had, in fact, already enrolled and completed his initial cadet training-- he had already become a 'firefighter' properly but had some discipline issues on his record when the event came up that allowed him to be a hero.

That and the Academy seemed more like an officer's training school than basic to me, that or it's got different tracks. Remember McCoy referred to himself as one of the senior medical staff for the Enterprise when he was getting Kirk aboard.

[Bounty]

Remember McCoy referred to himself as one of the senior medical staff for the Enterprise when he was getting Kirk aboard.

But he's not in the chain of command, and he was an experienced doctor before signing up. The standards for medical personnel, I'd imagine, would be quite different than the standards for command officers.

[mr friendly guy]

And then Scotty finds a way to beam them onto the Enterprise while at warp (based on an equation from an alternate reality where warp speed clearly works on a different scale) when minutes earlier Chekhov couldn't get a transport lock on a falling woman? Okay, tell me another one.

Wasn't that based on using some technobabble equations future Spock gave him?

Any way, my thoughts on the movie. Overall not too bad. I suspect I am a bit biased against it because recently I have been watching serials, so I am more used to plots taking a long time to come to fruition which gives the writers more time to develop it. Not possible in 2 hour showing, thus I kept on feeling a sense of underdevelopment. Take for example Eric Bana's character of Nero. We got his motivation, however he just didn't get enough screen time.

There were also a few points where the writers allowed the "rule of coolness" to over ride the rule of logic. For example Sulu's and that Romulan's elongating weapons look cool, however it was silly that they had to do that when they had goddamn guns. The reason why that extendable weapon worked in say Babylon 5 was that the Ranger's had to be discrete and less obvious. Such a consideration was not required here. If in the fight, somehow both combatants lost their firearms, then it would have made sense for them to pull out their sword / axe or whatever that Romulan was carrying.

Another example was inside of Nero's ship. There were multiple platforms to jump over, which gives us a sense of danger when Kirk was fighting there since there were no rails, and also had that good scene where the Romulans does the loooong drop after Kirk steals his gun and shoots him. However one wonders why the Romulans didn't design it with things like rails.

Oh, and that building a Starship on Earth instead of space, here is my explanation. It was pork barrelling. They needed to give some rural hicks jobs to stimulate the economy so they built it on Earth.

BTW, any one wonders what the "in universe" explanation for why the future UFP doesn't time travel to stop Nero. Come on, someone had to ask that. I am guessing that their ability to scan time lines is somewhat limited and that Braxton's ability to scan Voyager being out of time by a few hundred years involved a bit of luck.

[ray245]

I'm surprised that many Trekkies wants the timeline to be 'fixed' by the end of film. I mean seriously, which part of it is a different timeline/universe did they not understand?

It's like they want a mimic of the original series with new effects, something that they already have if I remember things correctly.

Ah, hard core trekkies.

[Stofsk]

A lot of the diehard Trekkies accepted Berman and Braga style storytelling. When many more left the franchise in droves because the quality took a nosedive, there were those fanatics who 'stayed the course' because Trek was their personal investment. To them, this reboot not only diminishes them but also endangers their sense of self-worth. Literally, how else do you explain the guys who are complaining that the film invalidates 40 years of established Trek lore? Someone made the quip here that it's like they're afraid a team of Black Hats are gonna kick down their door and confiscate all their DVDs and books and stuff.

[Gil Hamilton]

He mentioned he planned on torching every member planet- Earth was next due to convenience.

No doubt, but I think in choosing targets, the sequence was logical, so to speak. Vulcan because he wanted to punish Spock and because he is a Romulan. Earth, because its the very seat of the Federation and where a lion's share of StarFleet is from. Then he could have zipped off and blew up Andor or any other planet.

Oh, and that building a Starship on Earth instead of space, here is my explanation. It was pork barrelling. They needed to give some rural hicks jobs to stimulate the economy so they built it on Earth.

Definitely. The Distinguish Senator from Iowa no doubt brought home the bacon for a shipyard he coincidentally was the CEO of before he became a Senator and landed the Enterprise contract.

[Themightytom]

Well the one who was fighting Sulu went for his axe before his gun, but then this is a pack of pissed off miners, not soldiers.

The one Kirk went after though did get disarmed, and Kirk went for his phaser right after doing so.. which then got knocked away.


That and the Academy seemed more like an officer's training school than basic to me, that or it's got different tracks. Remember McCoy referred to himself as one of the senior medical staff for the Enterprise when he was getting Kirk aboard.

I like that Sulu clarified his specialty was "fencing" and then he pulls out... a collapsible katana? Too bad he didn't bring his foil, maybe he could have stabbed the miner from a distance instead of having to hack away. if they were going to be racist they should have gone all in and made Sulu a martial arts expert to explain the inevitable katana scene.

I'm pretty sure Cadet Darwin got his just desserts when he waited so long to deploy his chute. As soon as i saw the red space suit I made the throat cutting gesture to my brother, and there the guy goes being a cocky bastard and waiting for the last second only to bounce off like a noob and fall to his death.

I would have liked to see the conversations after that little debacle:

Kirk: "I saved your life!"
Sulu, "You made him shoot my frigging chute!"
Kirk: " Who brought the sword to the gunfight?"
Sulu: "well I saved all of us anyway"
Kirk: "because you couldn't find the E-brake??"
Chekov, "I was in command of the ship for a good half hour!"
All eyes turn to Spock.
Spock: "I dropped the ball on that one."
Uhura, "I was sitting RIGHT THERE!"
Spock: "I really blew it I know."

Regarding the Academy, Pike outlined an eight year path to captaincy which seems a little speedy if you ask me, wasn't kirk originally the youngest captain in starfleet at age 29 or somesuch? By Pike's math the average captain could be as young as 26. Which I suppose is a blow to Pike who appears to have been in starfleet for quite a while.

Incidently, they loaded all the graduates onto the reserve fleet and then the reserve fleet got annihalated, assuming there were "experienced" commanders and crew for those ships, Starfleet just lost a ton of recruits and new ships, yet... they stands were full when Kirk got his promotion... and they all wore red...

I'd be frigging nervous if I was a cadet.

[AMT]

Regarding the Academy, Pike outlined an eight year path to captaincy which seems a little speedy if you ask me, wasn't kirk originally the youngest captain in starfleet at age 29 or somesuch? By Pike's math the average captain could be as young as 26. Which I suppose is a blow to Pike who appears to have been in starfleet for quite a while.

He might have been talking about Kirk in general and not anyone (perhaps even blowing smoke up his ass to make him enlist)

Plus, just because he's a starship captain doesn't make his rank Captain. If it's anything like a wet navy, the Captain is the Captain, no matter his rank.

Even if not, he'd still be Captain at age 30 or so, since he was 22 when he joined Starfleet Academy.

(Hey. I'm sigged. Awesome!)

[Agent Fisher]

And I figured, the eight year track was for command only cadets, and then he would have ended up on a tiny destroyer or something to prove himself.

[Themightytom]

The command track or even blowing smoke up Kirk's ass interpretation works for me. now that I think about itt recruiters aren't generally known for being accurate.

Still if Uhura was a year ahead of Kirk because his entry to the academy was delayed she finished about when he did after three years, so assuming she had just finished first year the four year estimate stands.

(By the way I called the Spock and Uhura relationship the SECOND Spock clarified he was trying not to be preferential, because Uhura immediately C blocked him and clarified he would assign her to the enterprise. Kirk already lost his chance when he was doing her room mate.)

We know the Enterprise was brand spiffy new, what about the other ships? there is still the overall impression that those cadets were being trained for those ships, and despite being hustled onto them early, they were expected to be a new wave of some sort. Wouldn't it be more logical to be circulating the noobs amongst experience crews, and to be giving the new cutting edge ships to the veterans? Starfleet had six empty ships chilling in orbit which it can be cosntrued were the last line of defense, which starfleet gladly sent to handle an unspecified natural disaster at Vulcan? Who does that? Why not send one or two and leave a couple guarding Earth, that space station sure didn't put up a fight when nero arrived and I didn't see anything but the Enterprise batting an eye.

Earth seems to have had little or no defenses and its "reserves" were a bunch of almost graduates. it seems like they were in the process of expanding the fleet and got caught mid transition having sent the home guard off as reinforcements, assuming the cadets could cover things for a month or two.

[Knife]

There is also the possibility that Starfleet was expanding dramatically both in fleet size and operational size and large numbers of personnel were needed for all the new ships and facilities. Hell, there were only two personnel on that Federation outpost on delta whatever ice planet. Anyway, it's possible that with lots of new ships and bases and posts, SF needed lots of new people and the possibility to advance quickly due to potential is high.

[Oskuro]

I keep thinking about the fight on the drilling platform.

Sulu gets his chute pierced, almost falls into the beam, retracts the chute but has to eventually cut the wires, he pulls out his switchblade to cut them and - *k-tching!* It's a Katana! AWESOME.

That's the extent of my concern for the logic in that scene.

[Themightytom]

I keep thinking about the fight on the drilling platform.

Sulu gets his chute pierced, almost falls into the beam, retracts the chute but has to eventually cut the wires, he pulls out his switchblade to cut them and - *k-tching!* It's a Katana! AWESOME.

That's the extent of my concern for the logic in that scene.

I actually heard an objection to lowering a platform on a chain appearing primitive, but it seems like engineering a sort of reverse sky hook might actually be MORE advanced than blasting away with the ol' phasers.

Having seen Kirk and Co destroy the platform with handguns I am deeply dissappointed that Earth couldn't scrounge up a single missile to knock out the platform.

[Stofsk]

I keep thinking about the fight on the drilling platform.

Sulu gets his chute pierced, almost falls into the beam, retracts the chute but has to eventually cut the wires, he pulls out his switchblade to cut them and - *k-tching!* It's a Katana! AWESOME.

That's the extent of my concern for the logic in that scene.

I actually heard an objection to lowering a platform on a chain appearing primitive, but it seems like engineering a sort of reverse sky hook might actually be MORE advanced than blasting away with the ol' phasers.

Having seen Kirk and Co destroy the platform with handguns I am deeply dissappointed that Earth couldn't scrounge up a single missile to knock out the platform.

Did you miss the part where Nero tortured Captain Pike exclusively to garner knowledge of Earth's defences? Why is it inconceivable that within minutes of warping into orbit the Narada pinpointed whatever weapon installations existed and blasted them to rubble?

[Galvatron]

Is it better than any of the SW prequels?

Easily. The performances were solid all around and it was actually entertaining.

Did anyone else notice that Chris Pine has some really bad skin for an actor?

[JME2]

Did you miss the part where Nero tortured Captain Pike exclusively to garner knowledge of Earth's defences? Why is it inconceivable that within minutes of warping into orbit the Narada pinpointed whatever weapon installations existed and blasted them to rubble?

As mentioned earlier in the thread, a quick shot of shattered starship hulls and weapons platforms orbiting Earth would have helped reinforce the success of Nero's interrogation.

[Worlds Spanner]

I'll also chime in that the ice planet scene was really the clunkiest part of the film.

I thought it was hilarious that the door they used to get into the facility was a conventional late twentieth century metal door, complete with push-bar to exit. I mean, seriously? That was just lazy.

[Galvatron]

Maybe the information Nero gathered allowed him to either bypass or simply disable Earth's defences without firing a shot.

I thought it was hilarious that the door they used to get into the facility was a conventional late twentieth century metal door, complete with push-bar to exit. I mean, seriously? That was just lazy.

Because simple doors are obsolete in the future?

[Schuyler Colfax]

Did you miss the part where Nero tortured Captain Pike exclusively to garner knowledge of Earth's defences? Why is it inconceivable that within minutes of warping into orbit the Narada pinpointed whatever weapon installations existed and blasted them to rubble?

As mentioned earlier in the thread, a quick shot of shattered starship hulls and weapons platforms orbiting Earth would have helped reinforce the success of Nero's interrogation.

The second the bug went in it was obvious that the interrogation would be a success. A shot of The Enterprise crew taking the bug out of Pike after they rescued him would have helped though.

[Gil Hamilton]

I like that Sulu clarified his specialty was "fencing" and then he pulls out... a collapsible katana? Too bad he didn't bring his foil, maybe he could have stabbed the miner from a distance instead of having to hack away. if they were going to be racist they should have gone all in and made Sulu a martial arts expert to explain the inevitable katana scene.

The fencing thing, of course, was a throw back to TOS, but keep in mind that "fencing" is actually a fairly broad term and even somewhat appropriate. Japanese school Kendo clubs are often translated into English as "fencing" clubs, even though it is significantly different than any form of fencing; foil, epee, or sabre, that we may commonly use the term. I find this explanation, of course, somewhat suspect since Sulu was clearly American* in the movie and thus wouldn't translate kendo as fencing.

*Sulu was born and raised in California, I recall, despite having Japanese parents. Interesting, this was exactly the case with George Takei, and John Cho was raised in California as well.

Or else, he may well have specialized in sabre fencing, which in 200 years might have changes some to be more acrobatic. After all, he fought with the thing one handed, as you would a sabre, as opposed to a katana, which is typically fought with using two hands. I can imagine that in the future, there could be a branch of fencing that merges sabre with acrobatics... if you fence, you already put up with the fucking speed demon showoff fencers who practically are doing flips anyway.

[Worlds Spanner]

I thought it was hilarious that the door they used to get into the facility was a conventional late twentieth century metal door, complete with push-bar to exit. I mean, seriously? That was just lazy.

Because simple doors are obsolete in the future?

No, I just doubt that a facility in use in 2250 or so on a planet right next to Vulcan would have the exact same door that I remember from my elementary school in 1988. It's not that it was simple that was the problem, it's that it concretely broke the illusion of fantasy.

[Worlds Spanner]

That and the Academy seemed more like an officer's training school than basic to me, that or it's got different tracks. Remember McCoy referred to himself as one of the senior medical staff for the Enterprise when he was getting Kirk aboard.

What about "cupcake"? He appears later as a security grunt. Is that because unlike the rest of the guys he had bad grades so he didn't get to do bridge duty as a cadet, or is he a non-com? I've always thought that random security officers were among the more likely candidates for the mysterious missing enlisted men. I could see there being an Academy track for enlisted men, but I doubt he would have been there for three years.

[General Zod]

That and the Academy seemed more like an officer's training school than basic to me, that or it's got different tracks. Remember McCoy referred to himself as one of the senior medical staff for the Enterprise when he was getting Kirk aboard.

What about "cupcake"? He appears later as a security grunt. Is that because unlike the rest of the guys he had bad grades so he didn't get to do bridge duty as a cadet, or is he a non-com? I've always thought that random security officers were among the more likely candidates for the mysterious missing enlisted men. I could see there being an Academy track for enlisted men, but I doubt he would have been there for three years.

Doctors tend to get higher commissions than other personnel in real militaries, so it makes sense. They're not going to make a highly skilled surgeon a Lt. JG. if he's supposed to be in charge or second in charge of an operating facility.

[Bounty]

What about "cupcake"? He appears later as a security grunt.

The security department needs officers too?

Either that or he flunked out of the officer program and got repurposed as a guard.