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This ain’t your dad’s (or grandfather’s, for that manner) Star Trek.
With this stand-alone “Star Trek” joining the franchise, a whole new generation will no doubt be joining the brotherhood. Director J.J. Abrams wasn’t kidding around when he said he was going to stretch the definition of a “Star Trek” experience.
Diehard Trekkies may be miffed at timeline inconsistencies between the movie and TV series, but what was their option? The Star Trek franchise has been a hit-and-miss proposition these past three decades, and somebody had to reboot Gene Roddenberry’s dream.
The joke was that the even-numbered movies starting with “Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan” were the ones worth watching before the Next Generation premiered. I like to refer to this “Star Trek” as “Twilight” but with warp drive. The cast is young, cool — everybody here was born after the original television series premiered back in 1966.
First off, let me state here that “Star Trek” has everything a sci-fi fan would want.
There’s conflict at the outset, followed by endless action, otherworldly objects and time travel. That alone was worth the price of admission because, how can you have any space adventure without testing Einstein’s theory of relativity?
The idea of a prequel isn’t a new concept by any stretch but applying it here to “Star Trek” was the only way to go. The cast from the original series were reaching a point in time where it was getting silly seeing them on the bridge of the Enterprise. With this new movie, we not only get to see how the young cadets graduate from Starfleet Academy, but also get to see the first incarnation of the Enterprise and how it would be called their home from here on out. Among those young cadets is a rebellious and very cocky James Tiberius Kirk (Chris Pine), Spock (Zachary Quinto), Dr. “Bones” McCoy (Karl Urban) and one of my favorite Brit actors, Simon Pegg, plays Scotty. Zoe Saldana plays Nyota Uhura who most Star Trek fans know was never given a first name dating back to the television series. I just assumed she never had one but later discovered that series creator Gene Roddenberry never assigned one to her.
And yes, the others are all here including a nice cameo from Leonard Nimoy, who makes an appearance as an aged Spock. However, William Shatner is nowhere to be found, I’m afraid.
Speaking of cameos, there’s a cool “extra” here. Randy Pausch, the computer science professor who gained worldwide fame as the author of a “Last Lecture,” appears here. He was candid about his situation and discussed living life to its fullest in the face of terminal pancreatic cancer.
When director Abrams found out that Pausch was a huge Star Trek fan, he invited him to appear as an extra. Pausch wrote about the experience in his blog: “I got a custom-made Star Trek uniform and my own station on the bridge, where I had lots of buttons and controls. I even got a LINE!!!!” Pausch died July 25, 2008.
Before viewing this version, I dusted off my old VHS tape (yeah, I know, pretty old) of the TV series’ original pilot, “The Cage.” For you Trekkers out there, it was not the one that was rejected by NBC (but later emerged in 1988 during “Star Trek: The Next Generation”). Footage from that original pilot was later edited into what would become the 1966 two-part episode, “The Menagerie.” I’m referring to what aired as “Star Trek: Where No Man Has Gone Before.” It’s weird because, just think, if Kirk had been played by Jeffrey Hunter, who knows how the original TV show would have been?
It’s obvious that Abrams is a fan of Star Trek but also knows what it takes to create legions of fans who probably think of the series as a dinosaur. To that extent I give him huge kudos for drawing in those who already in their minds may have formed a Star Trek stereotype. When I said earlier that this movie was a stand-alone, I meant it as a compliment. It will draw in new audiences who won’t have to know the history of Star Trek. For the fans, though, there are plenty of inside gags and familiar names (Bruce Greenwood playing Capt. Christopher Pike, for one thing) that pretty much follow the Star Trek timeline. Abrams, however, puts his own stamp on this film that is at times in direct conflict with that of the small-box version. That said, this is truly one of these best ever and for me at least one of the most highly anticipated sci-fi movies so far this year.
“Star Trek” (2009) is rated PG-13 for sci-fi action, violence, and brief sexual content with a running time of 126 minutes.
— Howie Nave is a movie reviewer for Lake Tahoe Action
With this stand-alone “Star Trek” joining the franchise, a whole new generation will no doubt be joining the brotherhood. Director J.J. Abrams wasn’t kidding around when he said he was going to stretch the definition of a “Star Trek” experience.
Diehard Trekkies may be miffed at timeline inconsistencies between the movie and TV series, but what was their option? The Star Trek franchise has been a hit-and-miss proposition these past three decades, and somebody had to reboot Gene Roddenberry’s dream.
The joke was that the even-numbered movies starting with “Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan” were the ones worth watching before the Next Generation premiered. I like to refer to this “Star Trek” as “Twilight” but with warp drive. The cast is young, cool — everybody here was born after the original television series premiered back in 1966.
First off, let me state here that “Star Trek” has everything a sci-fi fan would want.
There’s conflict at the outset, followed by endless action, otherworldly objects and time travel. That alone was worth the price of admission because, how can you have any space adventure without testing Einstein’s theory of relativity?
The idea of a prequel isn’t a new concept by any stretch but applying it here to “Star Trek” was the only way to go. The cast from the original series were reaching a point in time where it was getting silly seeing them on the bridge of the Enterprise. With this new movie, we not only get to see how the young cadets graduate from Starfleet Academy, but also get to see the first incarnation of the Enterprise and how it would be called their home from here on out. Among those young cadets is a rebellious and very cocky James Tiberius Kirk (Chris Pine), Spock (Zachary Quinto), Dr. “Bones” McCoy (Karl Urban) and one of my favorite Brit actors, Simon Pegg, plays Scotty. Zoe Saldana plays Nyota Uhura who most Star Trek fans know was never given a first name dating back to the television series. I just assumed she never had one but later discovered that series creator Gene Roddenberry never assigned one to her.
And yes, the others are all here including a nice cameo from Leonard Nimoy, who makes an appearance as an aged Spock. However, William Shatner is nowhere to be found, I’m afraid.
Speaking of cameos, there’s a cool “extra” here. Randy Pausch, the computer science professor who gained worldwide fame as the author of a “Last Lecture,” appears here. He was candid about his situation and discussed living life to its fullest in the face of terminal pancreatic cancer.
When director Abrams found out that Pausch was a huge Star Trek fan, he invited him to appear as an extra. Pausch wrote about the experience in his blog: “I got a custom-made Star Trek uniform and my own station on the bridge, where I had lots of buttons and controls. I even got a LINE!!!!” Pausch died July 25, 2008.
Before viewing this version, I dusted off my old VHS tape (yeah, I know, pretty old) of the TV series’ original pilot, “The Cage.” For you Trekkers out there, it was not the one that was rejected by NBC (but later emerged in 1988 during “Star Trek: The Next Generation”). Footage from that original pilot was later edited into what would become the 1966 two-part episode, “The Menagerie.” I’m referring to what aired as “Star Trek: Where No Man Has Gone Before.” It’s weird because, just think, if Kirk had been played by Jeffrey Hunter, who knows how the original TV show would have been?
It’s obvious that Abrams is a fan of Star Trek but also knows what it takes to create legions of fans who probably think of the series as a dinosaur. To that extent I give him huge kudos for drawing in those who already in their minds may have formed a Star Trek stereotype. When I said earlier that this movie was a stand-alone, I meant it as a compliment. It will draw in new audiences who won’t have to know the history of Star Trek. For the fans, though, there are plenty of inside gags and familiar names (Bruce Greenwood playing Capt. Christopher Pike, for one thing) that pretty much follow the Star Trek timeline. Abrams, however, puts his own stamp on this film that is at times in direct conflict with that of the small-box version. That said, this is truly one of these best ever and for me at least one of the most highly anticipated sci-fi movies so far this year.
“Star Trek” (2009) is rated PG-13 for sci-fi action, violence, and brief sexual content with a running time of 126 minutes.
— Howie Nave is a movie reviewer for Lake Tahoe Action
