Star Trek into darknes

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OK, I'll bite, why are the new Star Trek movies unwatchable?

1) I grew up with the Enterprise crew and even managed to adjust to Star Trek The New Generation because the characters were people you could relate to. Cmdr Scott and I are both engineers, Geordie La Forge and I both had trouble with the ladies and I REALLY had the hots for Uhura when I was a kid. The new crew seem to be kids playing with the grown-ups toys.

2) Simon Pegg as Cmdr Scott. Totally silly casting.

3) The direction in the movies is horrible. Far too many spinning action shots and far too much use of lens flare.

4) The new movies are TOO different, for example the destruction of Vulcan.

5) The movies are too 'dark'. All of the Trek series have humor in them, 'The Trouble With Tribbles' being a prime example along with the treatment of Cmdr Data in his search for humanity.

The first Star Trek series I ever saw was The Next Generation episodes, the first movie I saw was First Contact. I guess the reason people could relate easier was because the original ST crew had nearly 30 years of material behind them, 3 seasons of the show and 6 whole movies which would be enough to flesh out their characters. Whereas the new crew only had 2 movies and no new TV series surrounding it. In fact all the movies before the 2009 reboot had a TV series that was airing at the time.



I don't actually mind that. Who else would they get?



The lens flare overkill is absolutely atrocious, I can't disagree on that. I hope Abrams hears these complaints and that this doesn't spill into the new Star Wars.



Does different have to be a bad thing? The destruction of Vulcan was pretty big but with it being a reboot why not take some risks with it. And seeing as how the story takes place in an alternate parallel universe, it's not like it completely erases the fact that William Shatner's Kirk is still around. For every chunk of people who complain about it being different, there's also a good portion that would complain if it stayed the same, so really you can't win.



What's wrong with dark? I would think a movie named "Into Darkness" would be dark on it's own. First Contact was also pretty dark too, with the Borg coming to attempt to invade Earth. And there was some humor in the new movies too, I got some of that from the Kirk-Spock banter that goes on.

Overall why can't the new movies be made for everyone, they shouldn't cater to just Star Trek fans because they're clinging to nostalgia.

Actually, it's quite the opposite. The reason these Abrams movies fail in the opinion of most trekkers, is because they are too calculating in their appeals to nostalgia, whilst putting limited effort into telling good, original, and intelligent stories.

FC, whilst being one of the better TNG movies, turned the crew into crudely drawn action hero caricatures, and ruined character continuity from the series. I wouldn't put that forth as a template for how to make a Trek film, in fact lazily following templates is what turned every trek film since 7 into a travesty.

The reason that Trek is more important than other sci fi "franchises" (I hate that word) aside from excellent writing, is that it provides a positive humanist backdrop which inspires people in positive directions. I don't care that his movies make money. I'm concerned with art that moves me, gets me to think, and inspires rather than degrades this species. They could do that and turn a profit. They choose not to.

First, isn't it popular opinion, even among Trekkies that even numbered movies are usually the better ones, regardless? Second, in this day and age I'm not really sure there's a such thing as an original story anymore, even when the first movies came out they were fairly simple. For instance in The Wrath of Khan, the story is Khan attempting to get revenge on Kirk for leaving him and his crew on that planet, while Kirk is feeling old himself. In itself that's fairly simple.

There are many reasons that the story telling potential of film seems much more restricted than literature. Among them is that studio's tend to want to stick with the product that they know will be profitable, by copying what has been profitable in the past. This is the real reason that Into Darkness featured Khan and so many retreads of scenes from Star Trek two. StarTrek was originally about exploring strange new worlds and I am disappointed that it goes forward by repeatedly going back to its own well and is not very creative about it. I will avoid new Star Trek adventures and that's a shame, because I appreciate the optimism and solid storytelling that used to be staples of the franchise.

I'll be honest, the last 20 minutes of the movie were very iffy to me because of the really obvious copy and paste from The Wrath of Khan, but everything else up to that was pretty good. Now regarding strange new worlds, that appears to be the theme going into the next movie, as told by the very last scene in the movie.

What about the questionable optimism in Star Trek 6, with Kirk and some others refusing to sign peace treaties with the Klingons because they were still uncomfortable around them? I mean, sure there was some for the main theme with both the Federation and the Klingons realizing they should try to work together but the main character having a personal bias, almost racism against them speaks of uncertainity.

Kirk distrusted Klingon's because every Klingon he had ever met was a bloodthirsty psychopath. I would argue that his stance on Klingons was akin to a healthy aversion to poisonous snakes. Though understandable, Kirk was wrong in his prejudice. From the perspective of logic and reason as embodied by Spock, Kirk was wrong. In the opinion of the values of the federation Kirk was wrong, and he is revealed to be wrong by the sincerity of Chancellor Gorkon and his daughter. This all speaks to a culture both within the narrative and on behalf of the writers that is informed by, and promotes humanist ethics, and this is the sense in which the film is optimistic.