Boldy Going Back to the Trekverse: The Star Trek Movies Revisited

So, lockdown viewing has led me to boldly return to the Star Trek movies to re-evaluate and rank them all. Set phasars to stun!

Just to nail my Trek credentials to the mast. I was a child of the 60’s, so the original series was formative in my love of science fiction. The starship/planet effects were, I thought, amazing (and, for the time, still do).

“The Next Generation” was also a ‘must-see’ for me, with its deeper, more thoughtful, stories. So I watched TNG from when it first aired in 1987 through to when it finally wrapped. But my hectic work-life intervened from me ever getting into “Deep Space 9”, “Voyager” or any of the more recent excursions.

So, overall, I’d categorize myself as an “early Trek” fan.

Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979).

One Mann’s Movies Rating:

Talent: The “usual original crew” (William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, James Doohan, Walter Koenig, George Takei, Nichelle Nichols); Persis Khambatta; Stephen Collins.

Director: Robert Wise.

Writer: Harold Livingston (based on a novel by Alan Dean Foster).

Financials: $83M on a $35M budget (2.4x multiplier).

Plot:

A vast and unstoppable cloud is heading straight for earth and destroying everything in its path. Admiral Kirk – bored and restless in his Starfleet staff job – takes a newly refurbished USS Enterprise, with a trainee crew, to intercept the entity and try to save the world.

Review:

Given the longevity of this series, this has never struck me as an auspicious start. Yes, it has its positives…

• The much repeated classic score by Jerry Goldsmith never fails to impress.
• There’s a striking ‘Deltan’ heroine in the shapely form of Indian model Persis Khambatta (who sadly died very young).
• And a twist in Alan Dean Foster’s story is genuinely clever (for those who know their space history).

However, all of this is outweighed by a story that is treacle-like in its telling. It’s a classic example of “look at how clever we are”, with special effects overriding everything else. A scene where Kirk travels to the Enterprise takes 5 minutes and 56 seconds (I looked up the Goldsmith track length): a scene involving nothing more than Scotty’s smug looks and Kirk’s awed reaction shots. Later in the movie, there are ENDLESS shots of the Enterprise travelling towards the centre of the cloud. Yawn! FOR F**CK’S SAKE GET ON WITH IT!!!

If this grand-standing was the quiet interlude between high-octane action sequences, then it might be partly forgiven. But even the action scenes are little less than soporific.

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982).

One Mann’s Movies Rating:

Talent: The “usual original crew” (William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, James Doohan, Walter Koenig, George Takei, Nichelle Nichols); Paul Winfield, Ricardo Montalban; Kirstie Alley; Bibi Besch; Merritt Butrick.

Director: Nicholas Meyer.

Writer: Jack B. Sowards.

Financials: $79M on an $11M budget (7.2x multiplier).

Plot:

Kirk’s ex squeeze Carol Marcus (Bibi Besch) and their headstrong son David (Merritt Butrick) are working on new terra-forming technology called “The Genesis Project”. In an effort to find a lifeless planet on which to test Genesis, Captain Terrell (Paul Winfield) and Chekov (Walter Koenig) find Khan (Ricardo Montalban): an old enemy, set for revenge on the Federation and Kirk in particular. Kirk and the Enterprise crew are locked in a battle of wits as they try to save the devastating Genesis device from falling into the hands of Khan.

Review:

Wowee! From the ridiculous to the sublime. This is how to make a Star Trek movie! If you were trying to bring back the action and fun of the original TV series, then what better than to bring back one of the original villains in a sequel to that story? And being able to cast the original actor (Ricardo Montalban) is just perfect.

Nicholas Meyer also clearly had the same frustrations about that first movie. The film barely pauses for breath. Interestingly, it clearly reuses footage from the original movie in travelling to the Enterprise in space dock, but cuts that 6 minute special-effects-porn-fest to about 20 seconds! It’s a striking comparison!

The movie “introduces” Kirstie (“Cheers”) Alley as Vulcan officer Saavik (although she was in a student-made feature the year before). She makes quite an impression. Also new to the series is Merritt Buttrick, playing Kirk’s son David. Sadly, like Khambatta from the last film, his Trek-voyage was to be short lived. Although he appeared in Star Trek III, he died of Aids just three years later.

The movie is also notable for launching the late James Horner onto the world stage as a leading film composer. Horner cleverly associates the “ship” in starship with a roistering seafaring motif that would be equally at home in a Hornblower movie as it is here. I remember leaving the cinema when this was released and heading STRAIGHT into HMV to buy the vinyl soundtrack!

There are very few things I can find to critique in this movie. It all holds up pretty well, even after nearly 40 years (MAN, I FEEL OLD NOW!) The only scene that perhaps grates with modern sensitivities is in the (supposedly comic) “lady driver” reactions from Kirk.

Star Trek III: The Search for Spock (1984).

One Mann’s Movies Rating:

Talent: The “usual original crew” (William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, James Doohan, Walter Koenig, George Takei, Nichelle Nichols); Christopher Lloyd; Robin Curtis; Merritt Butrick.

Director: Leonard Nimoy.

Writer: Harve Bennett.

Financials: $76M on $17M budget (4.5x multiplier).

Plot:

Spock is dead. Or is he? Having returned to earth, McCoy is going slowly mad with the essence of Spock locked in his head. With Spock’s body on the now embargoed Genesis planet, Kirk and the crew hijack the Enterprise to try to save their friend. But a Klingon captain (Christopher Lloyd) is also heading for the planet, intent of capturing the secrets of the Genesis device.

Review:

Why mess with a winning formula? Most of the original cast return for this next outing – with Robin Curtis stepping in for Kirstie Alley who “didn’t want to get typecast”. And the story continues from where we left off. But it all feels more forced this time. There are various absurdities in the story that make things very convenient! There are also things that make you say “hang on a minute” from Star Trek II. (For example, McCoy just stands there without objection in the funeral scene! Wouldn’t a “wait a minute” at that point have saved an AWFUL lot of grief??!).

Christopher Lloyd is wonderfully over the top as the Klingon commander, making a very believable baddie. And he really is a villain, allowing Shatner the opportunity to test his acting range (unfortunately, he singularly fails): “You Klingon bastard, you killed my son…. You Klingon bastard, you killed my son”.

Overall, it’s not a total disaster, but it all feels lacklustre and lazy after the glory of the Wrath of Khan. It makes you wonder what might have been if Nicholas Meyer had stayed at the helm to direct it instead of Nimoy.

Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986).

One Mann’s Movies Rating:

Talent: The “usual original crew” (William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, James Doohan, Walter Koenig, George Takei, Nichelle Nichols); Robin Curtis; Catherine Hicks.

Director: Leonard Nimoy.

Writers: Steve Meerson, Peter Krikes, Harve Bennett and Nicholas Meyer

Financials: $110M on $25M budget (4.4x multiplier).

Plot:

With Kirk and his crew now outlaws, but Spock restored, it’s time to return to earth to face the music. But they return to find an alien ship approaching earth transmitting climate-destroying signals and awaiting an answer. The only problem is that only whales can send the reply – no, I’m not making this up – and naughty old mankind has already driven them to extinction. It’s up to the Enterprise to travel back to the 1980’s to bring some whales back to the future and let them “phone home” to save the world.

Review:

Following a continued trend of alternating duff and good movies, here comes the most ‘non-Trek-like’ movie in the series: “Star Trek IV”, aka “Whale Meat again”.

By watching the films in sequence, I find the destructive alien ship approaching earth to be an obvious re-tread of “The Motion Picture” premise. But beyond that, the plot is completely bonkers. The time travel is trivially referenced as if they are nipping down to the local shops. But once there, there is fun to be had. Cue lots of comical fish out of water (no pun intended) situations for the 23rd century crew:

• Spock’s attempts to utilise colourful language;
• Chekov asking San Franciscans for directions to the “nuclear wessel”;
• “Computer?” asks Scotty to the Commodore 64 on the desk… (we won’t tell them that they don’t have to wait 300 years to be able to talk to computers!)

Catherine Hicks nicely plays the cute marine biologist and love interest (and only 10 years Shatner’s junior!) – – although her reaction to discovering the ‘truth’ is a rather unbelievable “oh!”. (Later edit: oops… dodgy maths…. the age difference between Shatner and Hicks is actually 20 years!)

All in all, although rather shoving its Greenpeace-style credentials down the viewer’s throats, this is a fun and family-friendly outing in the series.

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (1989).

One Mann’s Movies Rating:

Talent: The “usual original crew” (William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, James Doohan, Walter Koenig, George Takei, Nichelle Nichols); David Warner; Laurence Luckinbill.

Director: William Shatner.

Writer: David Loughery.

Financials: $52M on $28M budget (1.9x multiplier).

Plot:

A zealous and evangelical Vulcan, Sybok (Laurance Luckinbill), is on a mission to travel beyond the known universe to find Eden, and thus God. But he’s stuck on a barren planet and needs a starship to get him there. He creates a terrorist incident to lure Kirk and the Enterprise to the planet, to enable his trip to ‘the final frontier’.

Review:

What do you get if you put a famously egocentric star at the helm of a major motion picture? Star Trek V is the answer.

My least favourite movie of the entire franchise. There is just so much that is lame about this flick:

• the 57 year-old Nichelle Nichols doing a naked veil dance on top of a sand dune (I suppose they at least got her to do something other than repeating the computer, to quote a “Galaxy Quest” gag);
• Scotty knocking himself out on his own ship;
• the line “What does God need with a starship?”;
• “Row, row, row the boat”;
• “marshmelons” (uncorrected, and unexplained in the script);
• …. (I could go on).

Even the fight sequences seem lifeless and lacklustre.

Perhaps the lamest element of all is the final defeat of God (not God?). Chekov says that ‘He’ has “the largest energy source he’s ever seen”: and yet ‘He’ is dispatched via a simple laser blast!! #anticlimax.

The cast seem to be going through the motions as well on this one. That sense of “fun” was missing from the performances for me. Bizarrely the class act that is David Warner gets a “starring” role but is woefully underused, getting about 5 lines in total. He is totally superfluous to the plot.

The whole thing smells of utter desperation. If only we could get Nicholas Meyer back to direct another one: perhaps we could regenerate some of the “Khan” magic?

Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (1991).

One Mann’s Movies Rating:

Talent: The “usual original crew” (William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, James Doohan, Walter Koenig, George Takei, Nichelle Nichols); Christopher Plummer, David Warner; Kim Cattrall, Iman.

Director: Nicholas Meyer.

Writers: Nicholas Meyer, Denny Martin Flinn.

Financials: $97M on $30M budget (3.2x multiplier).

Plot:

The Klingon home planet is dying, and this is forcing peace talks between the warring race and the Federation. There are many against the concept, including Kirk. But a reluctant Kirk is tasked with bringing the Klingon ambassador Chancellor Gorkon (David Warner) and his military advisor General Chang (Christopher Plummer) to earth for the peace talks. But events do not go as planned.

Review:

“Star Trek is not bloody Shakespeare” – – I’m sure someone has said that at some point (probably, my wife!). But here, it is! The late Christopher Plummer comes roaring into the series joyfully quoting the great bard (from the original Klingon version!).

Trek got firmly back in the fast lane again with this movie. The fun was back! David Warner becomes the only character to date to appear in two consecutive Trek films as different characters (with curiously Michael Dorn becoming the next – see below!). He gets a meatier part this time though. But he – and indeed everyone else – is upstaged by Plummer’s marvellously over-the-top performance.

Iman is memorable as a cigar-smoking shape-shifting alien, leading to some wonderful Kirk-on-Kirk action, and the delivery of one of the best lines of comedy in the series: surprisingly self-deprecating for the normally ego-centric Shatner. There’s also a welcome call-back to the ‘Kirk gets the girl’ joke of the original series, which you realise, with a shock, has been completely missing from all of the previous movie outings.

There are also a nice range of cameo appearances in here. Christian Slater – a lifelong Trek-fan – has a bit part: apparently he framed, rather than cashed, his cheque! And Michael Dorn – already playing Worf in “The Next Generation”, and to appear as Worf in the next movie – plays Worf’s grandfather, a Klingon defence attorney!

But my favourite piece of trivia relates to a completely different film. Al Pacino was filming “Frankie and Johnny” in the studio at the same time, and a scene (sadly cut from the final film) called for Pacino to look surprised after opening a door. So director Garry Marshall arranged for Shatner, Nimoy and Kelley in full Star Trek costume, to be standing behind the door when he opened it. (Garry Marshall quote here). Love it!

Star Trek: Generations (1994).

One Mann’s Movies Rating:

Talent: The “TNG” crew (Patrick Stewart, Jonathan Frakes, Brent Spiner, LeVar Burton, Marina Sirtis, Gates McFadden, Michael Dorn), William Shatner, James Doohan, Walter Koenig, Malcolm McDowell, Alan Ruck, Whoopi Goldberg.

Director: David Carson.

Writers: Ronald D. Moore, Brannon Braga.

Financials: $118M on $35M budget (3.4x multiplier).

Plot:

On the maiden voyage of the NCC-1701-B, the Enterprise is forced into a rescue mission as a time/space distortion – “The Nexus” – threatens refugee ships. In the action. Kirk is lost. Flip forwards nearly 80 years and the “next generation” of the Enterprise NCC-1701-D, captained by Jean-Luc Picard, are dragged into battle with Soron (Malcolm McDowell) – a madman desperate to get back into The Nexus.

Review:

This was the movie that formally handed the baton from the ‘old crew’ to the TNG crew. It seems to be viewed by many as one of “the bad ones” (in the pretty consistent ‘good film-bad film’ flip-flop). But for me it’s one of my personal favourites, neatly blending the old and the new in a novel and inventive way. It includes the death of an icon (“Oh My” – great trivia question!) and the most spectacular demise of the Enterprise put onto film.

Patrick Stewart adds his usual RSC gravitas, and the scenes between him and Shatner are great fun. As Commander Data getting a dose of feelings from his ’emotion chip’, Brent Spiner is also great. The rest of the TNG crew get a mixed amount of air time, with the lovely Marina Sirtis putting in a great performance – particularly during the crash scene – but with Gates McFadden getting little other than an early bath!

The movie’s not without its issues though. Some the scenes – particularly one in ‘stellar cartography – could do with a lot of tightening up. This was director David Carson’s feature debut, after some previous Trek TV experience, and a more experienced movie director might have achieved an even better outcome.

Star Trek: First Contact (1996).

One Mann’s Movies Rating:

Talent: The “TNG” crew (Patrick Stewart, Jonathan Frakes, Brent Spiner, LeVar Burton, Marina Sirtis, Gates McFadden, Michael Dorn), Alfre Woodard, James Cromwell, Alice Krige.

Director: Jonathan Frakes.

Writers: Ronald D. Moore, Brannon Braga.

Financials: $146M on $35M budget (4.2x multiplier).

Plot:

Six years after being assimilated by the Borg (in the TNG episode “The Best of Both Worlds”) Jean Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) is still plagued by bad dreams and a mental connection to the hive mind. When the Borg finally attack earth, Picard defies orders and engages. But the Borg have a trick up their sleeve: they time-travel back to the 2060’s to prevent Zefram Cochrane’s historic warp flight, and then ‘first contact’, leaving mankind open to assimilation. Can Picard both thwart the plan and overcome his demons?

Review:

It’s a close run thing with “Wrath of Khan”, but this tops it as my favourite Trek film. There are so many memorable scenes:

• The dramatic opening shots of Picard strapped into the Borg ship (and the subsequent jolts x 2!);
• The comical drinking scene between Troi (Marina Sirtis) and Cochrane (James Cromwell);
• The “Big Sleep” style holodeck sequence;
• The spectacular entrance of the Borg Queen (Alice Krige);
• The first warp flight;
• The first contact scene, framed by Jerry Goldsmith‘s spectacular theme.

We’re up to the Enterprise-E in this one, and even that gets a self-destruct sequence! These movies must be playing havoc with their insurance premiums!

There are some nice touches for Trek fans in here: the first appearance of Robert Picardo‘s holographic doctor (before he became a regular on Star Trek: Voyager); and Dwight Schultz reprising his role from the TNG series as the nerdy fan-boy Lieutenant Barclay. In addition, the whole cast (including Gates McFadden’s Crusher) get a fairer share of the air time under Jonathan Frake’s direction.

Once again, the time travel (particularly the return journey!) is just a bit too trite and convenient. But other than that, this is a top-notch Trek movie. It features (in Alfre Woodard, just BAFTA nominated) a strong role for a female of colour. And it provides a great chance to showcase Stewart’s acting talents, as he wrestles with his own ‘great white whale’.

Given my love for the movie, I was tempted to give this one 5*s. The one thing holding me back is just a single line of dialogue. Do you know the one? Zephram Cochrane’s line…

“So, you’re astronauts? On some kind of a star trek?”.

It is just SO UTTERLY CRASS that I manage to throw up a little in my mouth as that scene happens. WHY WRITERS, WHY???

Star Trek: Insurrection(1998).

One Mann’s Movies Rating:

Talent: The “TNG” crew (Patrick Stewart, Jonathan Frakes, Brent Spiner, LeVar Burton, Marina Sirtis, Gates McFadden, Michael Dorn), F. Murray Abraham, Donna Murphy, Anthony Zerbe.

Director: Jonathan Frakes.

Writer: Michael Piller.

Financials: $113M on $58M budget (1.9x multiplier).

Plot:

The Ba’ku are a gentle, agrarian race appearing to lead an idyllic lifestyle. But their world is suddenly disturbed by the android Data (Brent Spiner) running amok among them, and exposing the whole of the Federation team that are “spying on them”. Why has the prime directive been so comprehensively ignored? The planet has a secret, and that secret is something that the Son’a race are determined to get at all cost. This includes having an uneasy coalition with a damaged Federation. As the plot thickens, it seems the cost of saving the Ba’ku needs to be an insurrection by the Enterprise crew.

Review:

This is the Trek movie that I’ve probably seen least often. It’s one that is very “planet-bound” ones (another of those is still to come in the series), and as such it has never grabbed my interest in the same way as many of the others. Having watched it again, it’s actually better than I remember it. The rejuvenating capabilities of the planet on Geordi LeForge’s eyes leads to a genuinely moving sunset scene. And love is in the air too. Firstly, between Picard (Patrick Stewart) and the ‘older woman’ Anij (Donna Murphy): very tastefully and nicely done. And secondly, the relationship is also rekindled between Troi (Marina Sirtis) and Riker (Jonathan Frakes), though you have to wonder if Frakes pulled ‘director’s privilege’ in getting the naked bath scene with Sirtis – lucky dog!

That being said, and despite the heavyweight involvement of F. Murray Abraham and Anthony Zerbe. the “First Contact” magic is rather missing here. There’s a sense of desperation when a previously unknown ‘Captain’s Yacht’ hoves into view (as if!) and when the Enterprise’s “manual steering column” (a PS/2 joystick!) pops up!

So, will the TNG era end with a bang or a whimper?

Star Trek: Nemesis (2002).

One Mann’s Movies Rating:

Talent: The “TNG” crew (Patrick Stewart, Jonathan Frakes, Brent Spiner, LeVar Burton, Marina Sirtis, Gates McFadden, Michael Dorn), Tom Hardy, Ron Perlman.

Director: Stuart Baird.

Writer: John Laird.

Financials: $67M on $60M budget (1.1x multiplier).

Plot:

Carrying the newly married Troi and Riker, the Enterprise is diverted from its course by the detection of positronic signals coming from a desert planet – could Data have a brother? But the planet is near the border with the Romulan neutral zone, and a familiar-looking Romulan warlord – Shinson (Tom Hardy) – while claiming to want peace with the federation, has darker intents.

Review:

This film should have worked. They had four years to work up the film: the biggest gap between movies in the series to date. The sets and special effects deployed are a notable improvement on “Insurrection” and are, at times, very impressive. It’s a movie that has personal angst for Picard; an epic space battle; and the death of a major character. And a young Tom Hardy turns in a memorable performance, belying what was to come: it’s interesting that this is only Hardy’s third feature (following his debut in “Black Hawk Down” just the year before!). It’s also a full NINE years before he won the BAFTA Rising Star award!

And yet it’s just not very engaging: I find myself fiddling with my phone while its on, which is never a good sign. Gone are any of the comic asides that have tended to lighten the mood of these films: this is dark and plot-heavy throughout. It’s even got a ‘mind-rape’ scene that is quite disturbing.

Naturally, the Enterprise insurance premium has taken another hammering by the end of the film. You can just imagine the discussion back in space dock… “no mate…” – sucking air in through his front teeth “…that whole front bumper’s gonna have to be replaced, and that’ll cost you a pretty packet”!

Combined with poor marketing and fierce competition (the film opening in the same month as “Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers”), this ended up with the worse financial performance of any of the Trek movies (in terms of budget to return ratio). And it killed the franchise. The only option was to be a full reboot: something that was to take another seven years to happen.

Star Trek (2009).

One Mann’s Movies Rating:

Talent: The “reboot” crew (Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Zoe Saldana, Karl Urban, Simon Pegg, John Cho, Anton Yelchin), Eric Bana, Leonard Nimoy, Bruce Greenwood, Ben Cross, Winona Ryder, Chris Hemsworth.

Director: J.J. Abrams.

Writers: Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman.

Financials: $386M on $150M budget (2.6x multiplier).

Plot:

Nero, a renegade Romulan from the future, arrives – coincidentally – on James T Kirk’s birthday to wreak his revenge against Spock and his home planet of Vulcan. Twenty Five years later, can Kirk – now a rough-edged Federation recruit – defeat the enemy with its futuristic weapons and save both Vulcan and the Earth from destruction?

Review:

As Leonard Nimoy says on the “making of” featurette, few directors can successfully deliver both ‘action’ and ’emotion’ in the same film, but J.J. Abrams can do. You can tell that he loved the original series, and adds both energy and ‘fan-friendly’ easter eggs into the movie:

• We saw Kirk’s death in “Generations” – here we see his birth, with a pre-Thor Chris Hemsworth as his heroic Dad!;
• The nasty Ceti Eel creatures are back from “The Wrath of Khan”!;
• We see the historic event of Kirk beating the Kobayashi Maru starfleet test;
• And we see all of the key characters meeting for the first time.

There are some surprises though. The fact that Spock and Uhuru are ‘a thing’ adds a spice to the film that feels like it messes with existing Trek lore. And similarly the destruction of Vulcan – giving this the highest body count of any of the movies! – has to be explained away with the old ‘parallel timeline’ ploy.

The action scenes work well, reliving the ‘submarine warfare in space’ elements that worked so well in the original series and the “Wrath of Khan”. A ‘space drop’ onto Nero’s ‘drill’ is particularly thrilling.

The casting is just about bang on, with Chris Pine pitch perfect as Kirk and Karl Urban particularly impressive as ‘Bones’ McCoy (although the evolution of the nickname – shown here – feels overly forced). The one character that I don’t get on with here is Simon Pegg’s Scotty: might be controversial, but he just doesn’t work for me.

Finally, the music by Michael Giacchino is a favourite score of mine. Simply thrilling and brilliant. I was lucky enough to hear it played live at a showing in the Royal Albert Hall a few years back, where both Giacchino and Abrams appeared on stage – – a truly memorable evening.

It’s not perfect. The whole “transportation of Scotty into the water works” irritates me enormously for some reason. And it’s somewhat glossed over what Nero and his crew have been doing for the 25 years while Kirk grows up: (Nero: “Man, I’ve finished ALL of my Sodoku books… when is this lockdown EVER GONNA END??”). And the JJ ‘lens flare’ is used to a level here that is mind-blowingly distracting! But as a reboot, in the main, it works.

Star Trek Into Darkness (2013).

One Mann’s Movies Rating:

Talent: The “reboot” crew (Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Zoe Saldana, Karl Urban, Simon Pegg, John Cho, Anton Yelchin), Benedict Cumberbatch, Leonard Nimoy, Bruce Greenwood, Alice Eve, Peter Weller.

Director: J.J. Abrams.

Writers: Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman, Damon Lindelof.

Financials: $467M on $190M budget (2.5x multiplier).

Plot:

While sat on the naughty step for a breach of the Prime Directive, Kirk (Chris Pine) is present when terror and tragedy strike at the very heart of Starfleet. A supremely powerful madman (Benedict Cumberbatch) has wreaked havoc and then escaped. Under the direction of Admiral Marcus (Peter Weller), Kirk pursues him to the Klingon home-world of Kronos on a mission of vengeance. But all is not as it seems.

Review:

This one seems to have received a very mixed reception among Trek fans, but I absolutely loved it when it first came out, giving it 4.5/5 in one of my early One Mann’s Movies reviews.

I find the pre-titles sequence on this one a real blast, both thrilling in content and enormously funny with the primitive stone age race trashing their previous relic in favour of their new Enterprise-shaped deity! And then the dramatic pseudo-blackmailing of Harewood, (an impressive Noel Clarke, when he was being given better roles that he is at the moment), to Michael Giacchino’s awesome “London Calling” music, is a truly memorable bit of movie-making.

The cast have all settled into their roles nicely. Chris Pine’s Kirk is still the arrogant ladies man (e.g. bedding twin aliens and chatting up the starfleet totty…. “Hi Ladies… Jim Kirk”), but learning the hard way that with great power comes at least a modicum of responsibility. He actually needs to act in this movie. And I find Scotty (Simon Pegg) slightly less grating in this outing (though his sidekick Keenser (Deep Roy) is still the annoying Jar Jar Binks of these films).

Benedict Cumberbatch adds great gravitas as the arch villain, and his announcement of his name was one of those “I am your father” movie-moments for me on first viewing.

It’s also the last screen appearance of Leonard Nimoy as Spock Prime – indeed, his last movie appearance period. A nice and fitting way to bow out.

My rating here is a little lower than my previous OMM rating. It’s attempts to shoehorn-in scenes and dialogue from an earlier Trek movie are a misstep by the writers, and grate on repeat viewing. But it’s still a cracking episode in the Trek saga, and another of my personal favourites.

Star Trek Beyond (2016).

One Mann’s Movies Rating:

Talent: The “reboot” crew (Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Zoe Saldana, Karl Urban, Simon Pegg, John Cho, Anton Yelchin), Sofia Boutella, Idris Elba, Lydia Wilson.

Director: Justin Lin.

Writers: Simon Pegg, Doug Jung.

Plot:

The crew are three years into their “5 year mission”. But in going through their own versions of a mid-life crisis, both Kirk and Spock are questioning their place in starfleet. Some shore-leave at the Yorktown starbase might help. But that leave is rudely interrupted when a distress call from Kalara (Lydia Wilson) is detected. Kirk and crew must stage a rescue mission into unknown territory which brings them into conflict with an alien swarm commanded by the warlord Krall (Idris Elba).

Review:

So, we reach the end (for the present time) of the trek. And, although others seem to like this one, I was left disappointed. I’ve actually only ever seen this movie once, at the cinema (my original review is here). But my second viewing left me feeling equally underwhelmed – in fact (without referring!) I came up with exactly the same so-so rating.

Yes, there’s action. If anything, there’s way TOO much frenetic action in the first 30 minutes. The use of the swarm is excellent (harking back to the deadly nanites in the original series): the Enterprise is used to defending itself against big things it can hit…. not thousands of tiny things! But (and I know this is all ‘make-believe’ stuff), all of the attacks, disintegrations and ‘landings’ in these films need to stay the right side of the ‘vaguely credible’ line. And this one oversteps it by some margin.

After that first 30 minutes, the plot stays pretty much planet-bound (never, for me, Trek at its best – see “Insurrection”). The action that ensues is pleasing enough, without ever recharging my dilithium crystals.

But my biggest complaint is with the story around the villain Krall. His rationale for his evil actions are never properly explained. And neither is how the ‘McGuffin’ device is supposed to operate, which is pretty crucial in the finale. How Uhuru manages to recognise who Krall really is from a brief ‘recharging’ scene seems unlikely (I seem to remember more of a “reveal” at the cinema…. was there a cut on the DVD version?). And why does he partially change back? So many questions, so few answers.

This was the last acting performance of Anton Yelchin before his untimely death at the age of just 27. The film is simply dedicated “For Anton” in the closing titles. And there is a nice on-screen tribute to Leonard Nimoy as well, which is both simple and touching.

So, not a high-spot in Trek movie history for me. But where will we be boldly going next?

Star Trek 14: The Undiscovered Country

It’s been six years now since the last movie, and with the reboot crew steadily aging, another chapter needs to be pretty imminent else – like Spider-Man – we will need to be into re-re-boot territory!

The 14th film has been in various stages of development since 2015. At one point the fascinating idea of a Quentin Tarantino project was mooted… but this has since faded away, unfortunately. (Shame!) A parallel “Beyond” sequel by Noah Hawley seems a more likely vehicle, but pre-production on that was halted by the pandemic.

So, as things stand, there is no imminent production for the next movie. You can keep tabs on the latest at the following wiki page.