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Star Trek Beyond is the worst title out of the reboots so far as it has no bearing on anything whatsoever and has always felt like a working title, yet is the best of those films.
‘Star Trek‘ was a bit bland, but was one way to do a reboot moniker – especially since that exact title had never been used before, although the film, itself, was quite lame. Star Trek Into Darkness was the best title for what became a disappointment after bringing in the man I call BenCum, since it was a very poor rip-off of ‘Khan’. Hence, I hoped Star Trek Beyond wouldn’t incur my Wrath…
Before I get to that, may the 4th be with them? With the death of Anton Yelchin, a rebooted TV series next year, and the fact that Into Darkness didn’t exactly set the box office alight (compared to the budget and promotion costs), I wasn’t so sure. However, according to IMDB, it’s in the planning, JJ Abrams has already said that Chekov won’t be recast and Chris Hemsworth is returning as George Kirk, although it’s not yet known whether it’ll be a flashback or some ridonculous intertwining timey-wimey bizarreness a la X-Men: Days Of Future Past.
‘Beyond‘ opens with an outstanding opening half-hour or so that makes for the most well-paced section of any of the new movies. There’s an amusing opener, before moving on softly as, at 966 days into their five-year mission, James T Kirk (Chris Pine) is about to have a birthday. That’s normally something to celebrate, but for him, that’s also the day his father died. Plus, this year marks the moment where he became one year older than his father would ever be. Before long, Krall (Idris Elba) turns up to wreak havoc, everyone crash lands on Yorktown (which I thought they kept calling ‘Your town’ for a while, making it feel like a KYTV sketch) and gets separated, after which they have to meet up and then deal with the foe in question. However, it’s the second act, where they have to find ways to reunite, which is the low point of this film as it seems to take forever to get there. Some are partnered up, while Scotty (Simon Pegg) is on his lonesome, yet soon pairs up with alien Jaylah (Sofia Boutella).
And before he leaves the Enterprise, why is Chekov constantly detailing everything that’s failing on the ship? I know that’s generally his job, but we can see it’s ‘game over’ for it, so just get the hell off it! Hearing his commentary is akin to being stuck in a traffic jam as the traffic news comes on and tells you that you might get stuck in a traffic jam.
Oh, and since Justin Lin (who directed Fast and Furious 3-6) is in the hot seat, he borrows from Furious 7‘s Paul Walker truck-going-over-cliff-leap-onto-a-car moment by recreating that in this film. Personally, I’ve yet to see one of those car-based movies, and I tried to watch No.6 when it was on TV but gave up after about 20 minutes. Fast 8 is released in April next year and I’m thinking I might still check it out in the cinema, since on the big screen, I get the impression that it’ll make more sense in terms of realising why they make these films.
Go to page 2 for more thoughts about this film…
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.