Our story opens on an alien planet where a figure in a gray robe flees from a temple while the natives chase him, throwing spears on the way. The figure proves to be Captain James T Kirk who had stolen – for reasons never explained – a scroll from said temple thus the ire of the natives. Gee, this almost looks like the opening scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark. Kirk soon joins Dr. McCoy and the pair continues to run for their lives. What was the plan here? Meanwhile, Spock, Sulu, and Uhura are in a shuttle hovering over an active volcano located next to the temple. Spock is lowered into the volcano so he can plant a device to prevent it from erupting and thus wiping out the natives. Well, things don’t work quite as planned. The shuttle engines overheat and the tether to Spock breaks. Was there a plan here? Simple, we just beam Spock to the ship. Where’s the Enterprise? Oh, it is underwater! Kirk and Bones jump off a cliff and swim down to the submerged SPACE ship. Though Scotty was able to beam Sulu and Uhura to safely before the shuttle crashed, he can’t lock onto Spock except by line of sight. The ship’s current position is a real problem, seeing as there is ocean and continent in the way. What genius decided to park the ship in an ocean? Well, since we are in this really stupid position, the only way to save Spock is to break the Prime Directive (note that was the Prime directive, not the secondary or tertiary directive). The ship surfaces to the natives’ astonishment and as it flies over the volcano, Spock is beamed aboard. And there you have the introduction to J. J. Abrams latest travesty in the Star Trek universe.
Knowing that the objective was to prevent the volcano from erupting and wiping out the primitive natives, what might have been a better plan? Maybe setting the anti-volcano device on a several second delay and transporting it from orbit? Oh, but look at all the awesome action we’d miss! As for Kirk stealing the holy scroll, I am still baffled. Why? My best guess is that he was trying to lure the natives away from the impending detonation. Even so, I have no idea why Bones would be there. Is he particularly suited to running from natives? The sad thing is that it gets worse.
Lacking any original ideas, the writers bring back Khan (i.e. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan) as a villain. Khan has magic blood that appears to be a cure for death. Yep, Dr. McCoy synthesizes a serum that revives a dead tribble and maybe a major character that dies in a scene stolen from… Wrath of Khan. I was really annoyed when the last film had Kirk and Scotty beam aboard the Enterprise while it was light years away and traveling at warp speed. This time, we have a personal transportation device that allows the villain to transport himself from Earth to the Klingon home world! Really? Such technology is going to make starships obsolete. Such a technology would massively revolutionize space travel and is far beyond what was possible in Star Trek The Next Generation. As for the starships, warp speed has really gotten impressive. The ship is a short distance from the Klingon home world – which the Klingons seem not to notice – and warps back toward Earth. They have hardly hit warp speed when an enemy ship catches them and blasts the Enterprise. So, where are we? Oh, pretty much in Earth orbit. So the distance from Earth to the Klingon home world is a few minutes at warp speed? Two starships are essentially in Earth orbit and one fires at the other. Earth responds by doing nothing. One of the starships is on a collision course with San Francisco and the response is… nothing. We have all of Earth and the only people who can do anything are the crew of the Enterprise.
Benedict Cumberbatch seems nothing like Khan. First, it is a bit annoying that we have a pasty white fellow playing Khan. But Khan had a combination of charm and menace, a man who would smile warmly while he twisted the knife. Cumberbatch is all menace and brooding.
Scotty goes scouting coordinates that Kirk gave him. He finds a space station there. Amazingly, the space station doesn’t seem to notice him. In a miracle of timing, some ships arrive and enter the space station – Scotty just joins the group and enters unseen. Seriously? This is a military space station and it neither noticed the approach of a shuttle or that the shuttle came aboard. Well, such incompetence probably explains later parts of the film.
So, Scotty is off the ship and Kirk needs a new chief engineer. Let’s see, I have all these engineers down in engineering, one of whom is probably second only to Scotty. So, let’s pick Chekov. Yes, I understand you don’t want to introduce new characters but this still grated.
Spock and Uhura are involved and their relationship is repeatedly brought to the foreground, often with Uhura nagging Spock for his logic and lack of feelings. Umm, you know he’s a Vulcan, right? But, just to prove he’s got feelings, a tear runs down his cheek when a major character dies. Oh, and Kirk cries too when a different character dies. I don’t think William Shatner’s Kirk ever cried, even when those Klingon bastards killed his son. The Spock – Uhura relationship was ill-conceived.
Chris Pine’s Kirk is disappointing. It’s not that I think he should emulate Shatner, but it would be nice if he kept to the character. His Kirk is frantic rather than deliberate, foolhardy rather than brave, and reckless rather than daring. At one point, we see him in bed with two alien women. Really? He has to be convinced not to do something rash on more than one occasion. At another point in the movie, he is faced with the Kobyashi Maru moment where he’s going to lose his ship and crew and his response is… “I’m sorry.” In Wrath of Khan, Kirk repeatedly outmaneuvered Khan but here it is the other way around. Kirk captures him only because he chose to surrender. Kirk survives a spacewalk only because Khan guides him, and Kirk survives secondary villains only because of Khan. Khan plays Kirk the entire time but Kirk blusters as if he is the one in control. Sigh.
The plot is just an opportunity to string together unlikely action sequences. There is an amazing amount of running! It’s all very exciting mindless fun. And that is the biggest problem. Star Trek was never mindless. If anything, the Kirk era of Star Trek was preachy with a morality tale in virtually every episode. Kirk often explained the moral at the end. If there is any moral here, it is that the enemy is us. Yeah. Again with the self-loathing and we made Khan what he is and those chickens have come home to roost. Lovely.
With what J. J. Abrams has done to Star Trek, I am concerned what he plans to do with the other great sci-fi classic, Star Wars. Well, he probably can’t do any worse than Lucas did in Phantom Menace.
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