Star Trek

So, last night, Sunny and I finally got around to watching the new Star Trek movie. Personally, I thought it was awesome…but I wouldn't be a proper geek if I didn't have a few complaints.

First of all, the original series of Star Trek was never what you'd call 'hard sci-fi', but halfway through the movie I couldn't stop myself from calling the 'Red Matter' 'Black Hole Plot Device Juice'. I mean, what is it? A little explanation? I don't mean devote fifteen minutes to the pseudo-science of it, but at least hand wave it a little.

Now, I've written before about how people who say 'as if!' while watching a sci-fi or fantasy movie have sorta missed the point… but I've also written about how movies should be internally consistent. In other words, they can make up their own rules, but once they've done that, they have to stick to them. So what the hell is the deal with this movie's black holes?

So, you inject a tiny drop of 'Black Hole Plot Device Juice' into a planet's core, where it forms a black hole and completely destroys the planet by crushing it. That I get…what I don't get is how a space ship can then fly through that very same black hole and come out the other side without a scratch. Does it destroy things, or send them backwards in time?

However, the one major thing that jumps out at me in this movie is the really, really, really bad writing in places…where characters do ridiculous, totally out of character things that result in billion to one chances that jus so happen to move the plot forward.

So, in this movie we've already discovered that young Spock is all about the rules and regulations. Then, in the middle of the movie, instead of sending Kirk to the Brig for starting a fight on the bridge, he decides to stuff him in an escape pod and maroon him on a planet…a snow planet…filled with monsters…where he just so happens to find 'Spock Prime' in a cave.

It's not just young Spock deciding to maroon Kirk, it's the idea that with an entire fucking planet Kirk lands within walking distance of Original Spock. That's like throwing a dart at a map of the world while blindfolded and managing to hit the exact location of your house.

Last but not least, what was the deal with all the lens flares? Every two seconds… Spaceship flies past the camera, lens flare, Spock stands on the bridge, lens flare, someone scratches their nose, lens flare.

Seriously, it was like they finished the movie and then handed it over to a Myspace kid with their first copy of photoshop.

Overall, though, I thought it was a good movie. As a life-long Trek fan, even I was willing to admit that Star Trek had become far too preachy and took itself way too seriously. It was a good summer movie, I just hope that the plot is a little more thought out in the next one and they don't have as much obvious Deus Ex Machina in the story.