Star Trek (ST:XI)

[ajcardfan]

i agree that it gives them freedom ..... it will also help curb the dopey debates about what could/should/would happen and constant comparisons to how they fit with the original run

they wanted to respect the history of the franchise, while making it more modern and appealing to a broad audience ....... i think they did a phenomenal job at this and were able to keep many fans of the original franchise while tapping into many people who just didn't care for the originals

now the challenge is to keep things energetic and fresh and not waste the reset that you gave yourself

Totally agree with your take. I was truly surprised by how well they pulled off the casting and the "re-set". I think if the writers stay focused on the characters, and let the action and special effects support that, they can avoid the mistakes of the Matrix, Pirates and Transformers movies, etc, that made the sequels so bad compared to the first movie.

 

[mojorizen7]

I for one loved the reset. I think it gives the writers much more freedom. There is so much set in stone that I think you would have tied the hands of the writers to get every single little thing correct and event correct. Asking a writer to write in a tiny little bubble would limit creativity IMO.

I also don't think that it says the rest of the movies are BS since you don't know which events will still happen (that we know to be true). My guess is that certain major events in Trek History will remain the same.

I'm just saying it wasn't necessary. I think most Trek die-hards(like myself) would be able to suspend their disbelief enough to have the writers just follow this movie up with all new random stories told during the original 5 year mission even though the sets(production design),special effects, actors, modern dialogue etc.. were obviously different from the original '60's series.

All they had to do in terms of writing this new movie was to give us all the origin & background of these legendary characters and make them interesting and believable(which they did) and toss in an action-packed interesting sci-fi story and "poof!" ....you've still got your launching pad for more movies in the future.
What limitations?...That you can't kill off Kirk for 200 more years?
That Spock doesn't take one in the chin for the Enterprise in Trek II?

The movies began in '80 IIRC, they took place after the 5 year mission,so go make great movies with this new cast prior to and leading up to Star Trek The Motion Picture.
IMO no need to go the route of "well if we want to kill off Scotty in the next film we can do that...."

Hire some quality writers that don't have to kill off key characters in order to make it interesting....like they did back in the 60's.
What a novel idea

 

[Covert Rain]

I'm just saying it wasn't necessary. I think most Trek die-hards(like myself) would be able to suspend their disbelief enough to have the writers just follow this movie up with all new random stories told during the original 5 year mission even though the sets(production design),special effects, actors, modern dialogue etc.. were obviously different from the original '60's series.

All they had to do in terms of writing this new movie was to give us all the origin & background of these legendary characters and make them interesting and believable(which they did) and toss in an action-packed interesting sci-fi story and "poof!" ....you've still got your launching pad for more movies in the future.
What limitations?...That you can't kill off Kirk for 200 more years?
That Spock doesn't take one in the chin for the Enterprise in Trek II?

The movies began in '80 IIRC, they took place after the 5 year mission,so go make great movies with this new cast prior to and leading up to Star Trek The Motion Picture.
IMO no need to go the route of "well if we want to kill off Scotty in the next film we can do that...."

Hire some quality writers that don't have to kill off key characters in order to make it interesting....like they did back in the 60's.
What a novel idea

I am a diehard and I think it would be almost impossible without treading on what came before it. There are events and stories (a ton of them between the series, animated series etc..) that die hard fans followed that you would have to "dance" around constantly. You would have to write in this box. Sure there are writers that could probably do it but it limits creativity.

Not to mention that the #1 thing I heard from die hard fans about going back to the start was ..."what is the point we already know what happens". Now we don't necessarily know what happens and anything is possible.

This is exactly what trek needed to survive. A complete reboot. Die hard Trek fans have proven over the last several years, they are not enough to sustain the franchise any longer. A new generation had to be brought in without all of the baggage of the past. Trek was dying on the vine and even Paramount executives had made comments like if this had failed....Trek might not come back for a very very very long time.

 

[D-Dogg]

JJ Abrams is a genius.

 

[NoelPHX]

Still awesome the sixth time seeing it..................

 

[conraddobler]

I am a diehard and I think it would be almost impossible without treading on what came before it. There are events and stories (a ton of them between the series, animated series etc..) that die hard fans followed that you would have to "dance" around constantly. You would have to write in this box. Sure there are writers that could probably do it but it limits creativity.

Not to mention that the #1 thing I heard from die hard fans about going back to the start was ..."what is the point we already know what happens". Now we don't necessarily know what happens and anything is possible.

This is exactly what trek needed to survive. A complete reboot. Die hard Trek fans have proven over the last several years, they are not enough to sustain the franchise any longer. A new generation had to be brought in without all of the baggage of the past. Trek was dying on the vine and even Paramount executives had made comments like if this had failed....Trek might not come back for a very very very long time.

I for one loved this movie, thought it was great but the larger issue of Star Trek dying off as a phenom was IMO just because Gene died and then there wasn't one vision anymore that trumped all others.

TNG was a great follow on, it stood on it's own and moved the whole thing forward, which IMO is the key to Star Trek, it takes place in the future and in the limitless expanses of space so there is IMO no need to really go backwards in it except to recapture nostalgia for fans.

The idea it could ever really get stale going forwards in time is ironic to me, and I agree it was getting stale but that's more due to the competition to take it in different directions.

Voyager was a bad idea, might as well have been lost in space, DS9 was alright but I didn't like the fact it was set on a stationary space station, sorta defeats the point.

Those two killed off the thing worse than anything IMO.

They were IMO sort of cheats, they didn't develop the next flagship captain and crew, that's kinda the essence of Star Trek IMO, the best captain and crew you get to follow along with, you get to meet new ones, they do new stuff, but once you start these offshoots and plot lines out in the Star Trek universe you're losing the essence of the thing IMO.

DS9 wasn't too bad but it was a dead end, that's death to the franchise IMO.

Star Trek has been a tv series but what happens is a new crew is introduced, the backstory takes forever to develop via tv then movies come in and when you do the movies you kill the tv series just by ramping the costs of the actors to the moon.

Once you do movies with one crew you almost have to start a new one on TV, because they're cheap and when they get to the movies stage they're over as a tv series too, the problem with all this is the real time nature of generations causes there to need to be a time lag between series, in the modern world we are too impatient to wait the required time, they tried to stuff the channel and still are trying to do so now by going backwards.

Soon enough there will be a void for a new TV series to go forward and they will I think.

 

[jefftheshark]

It is very unusual to see anything actually un-jump the shark, but I felt they accomplished this task quite handily.

The best thing about TOS, and TNG for that matter, was that we cared for the characters. We knew what made them tick and what all their interactions were (who liked who, who hated who, etc.). For me, this new movie was like seeing a bunch of childhood friends at a class reunion, and then finding out that their lives were different from what I had previously heard. To steal a word from the original Mr. Spock, it was "fascinating".

But I never felt that way about DS9 or Voyager. Neither the storyline nor the characters were particularly compelling. Of the shows I watched, I could never imagine that I would want to spend $10 to watch any of these people in a movie theater.

But the new Star Trek, I can hardly wait for the next installment.

JTS

 

[Pariah]

This movie was friggin' sweet.

Brilliant casting all the way around...especially "future" Spock. Dead on.

 

[arthurracoon]

Finally saw this over thanksgiving

Fantastic.

 

[Gaddabout]

Now that everyone's seen this movie, go rent Trekkies the documentary.

 

[Shane]

Now that everyone's seen this movie, go rent Trekkies the documentary.

Hell NO!

 

[Gaddabout]

Hell NO!

Why not? It's entertaining, in a freak show kind of way.

 

[Shane]

Why not? It's entertaining, in a freak show kind of way.

Trekkie's scare the bejeesus out of me. Kind of like Kids and clowns. (sorry BIM)

 

[Gaddabout]

Trekkie's scare the bejeesus out of me. Kind of like Kids and clowns. (sorry BIM)

OK. I can see that. Legitimate excuse. Especially considering the film prominently features Barbara Adams, the Trekkie on the Whitewater jury.

 

[Russ Smith]

Finally saw this last night. Girlfriends sister and husband insisted we'd like it so we got it from Netflix. Absolutely loved it, was really surprised I didn't see anyway they could make a good Star Trek movie again but they did.

I thought they pretty much nailed all the characters from the original, they had enough references to that to please people who grew up watching the show, even those of us who DO realize it was a tv show!

Really well done.

 

[Cardinals.Ken]

Creepy...

 

[Dback Jon]

Creepy...

LMAO

 

[Cardinals.Ken]

LMAO

 

[Bada0Bing]

Ha, this was a funny thread to read through. Almost everyone was freaking out over the casting and they ended up absolutely nailing it. Fun movie. I never cared for the show, but this film was great.

Sent from my SCH-I510 using Tapatalk 2

 

[jf-08]

Just saw Star Trek this weekend with the kids. We really enjoyed it. Pretty good casting and exciting story.