Time Is Fleeting, Madness Takes Its Toll

Simply put, Star Trek is better than I thought it could be. I'm not saying it's the greatest movie ever. It's not even the best Star Trek movie. I'm just saying that I figured if it was good, it would basically hit a quality wall which it would never get beyond. If I had to compare it, I rank it as equal to Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. It's a mix of exciting science fiction action, interesting characters and intelligent plotting that is found in your better action films. Oh sure, there comes a point where the "intelligent plotting" comes to a screeching halt, but we'll get to that.

There are changes made to the continuity and mythology of Star Trek itself but hey, it's not like anyone really gives a damn about all that stuff, right? I'm talking significant and catastrophic changes in the timeline that caused me to stay the hell away from any and all online forums, message boards and comments sections that had even a vague connection to Star Trek.

The movie starts as many Star Trek adventures start, with a Federation starship investigating some abnormal readings in some godforsaken part of the galaxy. The anomaly they're investigating turns out to be a rip in the space-time continuum through which a Romulan ship arrives. As always happens, some crewman yells, "SHIELDS DOWN TO 40%," after the first photon torpedo hits and the Romulan captain, Nero (Eric Bana), demands that the Federation captain come aboard his ship. Captain Anonymous Bitpart tells his First Officer, Commander George Kirk, that he's in charge. This was a bad time for Kirk as his wife is about to give birth but the Romulans don't seem to care about that so he takes the bridge. Naturally, everything goes to crap and George Kirk is called upon to sacrifice himself for the sake of the crew. He does get to hear the cries of his newborn son, Bronx Mowgli Kirk. But I kid, that's baby James Tiberius Kirk he hears over the radio just before his ship blows up.

We see little Jimmy grow up to look a lot like an actor named Chris Pine and be a rambunctious juvenile delinquent who one night starts chatting up a sexy Starfleet cadet named Uhura (Zoe Saldana) and ends up in a fight with her buddies. The fight is broken up by Captain Christopher Pike (Bruce Greenwood*) who encourages him to stop being such an angry young man and honor his father's legacy by joining Starfleet. Sure enough, we see him three years later at Starfleet Academy cheating his way to winning a supposedly unwinnable computer simulation called the Kobayashi Maru designed by a Vulcan named Spock. Kirk and Spock come into conflict over this so, gosh, I guess they'll never become friends.

Starfleet doesn't have time to kick Kirk out of the Academy because of an emergency situation that requires all available ships including Pike's Enterprise. Kirk recognizes the enemy as that which killed his father 25 years earlier so he sneaks aboard with the help of his best buddy, Dr. Leonard McCoy. We meet the rest of the original Enterprise crew along the way to Vulcan which is being attacked by Nero's ship.

This is where The Big Event happens. I don't know what else to call it since it shouldn't be revealed to those who haven't seen the movie but it's Big. Really, really Big. Star Trek's history changes and even the characters recognize that they're now in an alternate timeline and that their future is wide open for both them and the writers. A lot of people hated this but it didn't bother me a bit. Well, it did because it's a depressing event but not because things are now different. Up to this point, I believe the story made sense and successfully suspended disbelief. Unfortunately, there comes a point where it simply stops doing that. Coincidences start piling up. Kirk lands on a planet in the just the spot where he needs to have a fortuitous meeting with a familiar stranger. It turns out Nero is angry because, in the future, his planet Romulus is destroyed by a supernova but exactly how this happens is very convoluted and the solution (turn the nova into a black hole) sounds just as bad. I also found it hard to believe that 400 years in the future we travel faster than light, travel through time and have sensors that can tell us that two microbes are doing it in the Delta Quadrant yet we can't tell when a star near a populated planet is about to blow up.

Still, things get back on track, the action starts up again and Kirk ends up going from being a nearly-washed out cadet to Captain of the Enterprise in the space of a few days (don't ask).

Despite the dumb stuff, it's a very good and exciting movie. My advice to the world is: SHUT THE FUCK UP ABOUT THE CONTINUITY! It's an alternate timeline now. The filmmakers can now have Kirk order a pepperoni pizza without contradicting the 1966 episode where he said he hated pepperoni. If you liked the old Star Trek, it's still there. Rent the DVDs or just watch YouTube or Hulu or Netflix or iTunes or God only knows how many other venues have the last four decades of the various chapters of Star Trek available. Your world has not ended and your childhood is not ruined. The fact that, as far as Star Trek is concerned, you really can eat your cake and have it too doesn't seem to be good enough for a segment of the fan community but that's too damn bad. The new movie's a big hit which means more sequels set in the new world so it's time to get over yourselves and enjoy what you have.

Make it so! (A phrase that will now never, ever be said because Picard will probably never exist SO CHEW ON THAT FANBOYS!)

*You may remember the character being played by Jeffrey Hunter in the classic "Menagerie" episode. Greenwood's appearance in this movie should once and for all settle the age old "Is Greenwood or Hunter better as Pike?" debate.