J. J. Abrams is a hack and I hate that he keeps getting work
Eh, he’s done some decent work he just isn’t always the right fit for the properties he’s given.
Sorry I can’t read your comment. The 20 lens flares he put on screen still have me blinded
Edit: to be clear. I don’t think his movies are bad per say. They’re just painfully mediocre.
The JJ lens flare then made it into DISCO although I think they toned it down a bit for SNW. I checked out of SFA after 3 episodes so I don’t know if they continued to be flare happy there.
For better and worse, Discovery took a lot of cues from the Abrams films, being more action focused, with flashier effects and cinematography, for example.
It got toned down as time went on, but there were parts here and there in Discovery where you can tell they were trying to replicate the films.
Yeah, the Disco premiere was very action-oriented, very JJ coded. I was like, ok, they’re trying to draw in viewers with a flashy beginning, but hopefully they’ll start being a proper Star Trek show soon. Oh, well. Happily, some people liked the show, but it wasn’t my cup of tea.
*per se
As long as you don’t let him anywhere near the plot.
You can be a hack and still do great work, look at Ridley Scott.
Like Chris Nolan. Has his name attached to a couple good things and now he’s treated like King Midas
Yeah, but he actually succeeded though.
Star Trek 2009 revived a franchise that had been dead since Nemesis, reviewed well, is still the highest grossing Trek film ever made, and regularly appears near the top of lists of the best films in the franchise.
It really was obnoxiously enjoyable; In the words of Aurelio Voltaire, “Someone tell me why I love this film so fucking much”. It wasn’t golden era new gen philosophy trek, let alone the heights the series hit during the “Suck it Straczynski, we can write überplot too” era of DS9, but it was far, far from the depths that Final Frontier
and generationstook the series. Imo, it was a lot more coherent than Nemisis and had way better characterization of the villains than Insurrection, the two most “action trek” of the films. It was never going to be Khan (ranking among the most influential science fiction media period), but I don’t think anyone intended it to be.… the rest of the trilogy though, hot fucking garbage. The kirk motorcycle fight is pure power-cringe, and JJ should be executed for the whole “Bumblesnatch as Khan” fiasco.
The kirk motorcycle fight is pure power-cringe
Absolutely, yes - it was silly.
But - the only reason we never got that motorcycle fight earlier with Shatner was lack of budget.
It doesn’t fit the tone of orignal Trek because original Trek couldn’t afford it, not because original Trek would not have sunk that low, if it could have. Haha.
It really was obnoxiously enjoyable
Was it though? I could see it if you changed the audio track to a language you don’t understand, because it does have a lot going for it; the production design and costumes, set design and construction are all outstanding, sound design is still some of the best there’s ever been (especially when it came to modernizing legacy sfx), obviously the vfx and novel approaches to cinematography (yes, including the lens flares) are all great, etc etc.
But literally every last thing about the story is stream of consciousness, fever dream nonsense, which in any other franchise might be forgiven, but for Star Trek of all things to have such boneheaded threads of anti-science magical thinking, noxious xenophobia and childish cruelty is unforgivable. It’s a top to bottom garbage script, ironically produced with one of the most talented film crews in sci-fi movie history, which for my money anyway, makes it even more tragic and hard to enjoy.
It wasn’t a good Star Trek story, but it was a good spectacle. The whole thing was basically nostalgia with little else, between the brain worms, Spock, Romulans, Kirk being made Captain with the crew, etc.
The only thing it was really missing was the Borg and Dominion.
But I’d argue that spectacle was what Star Trek needed at the time, to make a casual audience want to watch more of the actual Star Trek, and bring it back to the cultural fore.
At that point in the 2000s, Star Trek basically had the reputation that it was a boring TV show for nerds, where you’d be watching people sit around and talk politics for an hour, over panning shots of planets and the Enterprise.
Star Trek of all things to have such boneheaded threads of anti-science magical thinking, noxious xenophobia and childish cruelty is unforgivable.
I don’t know if that’s necessarily true, since even the TV shows have had the Federation express those viewpoints before, with little to object against them.
If Data or the EMH MK. I were human, their treatment at the hands of Starfleet would be plainly unconscionable. Admiral Satie shows that anti-Romulan sentiment is still alive and well within the Federation, enough that she could tap it for her crusade without much pushback. Former Borg drones, like Picard, or current ones, like Hugh, are also treated with considerable hostility, even if they aren’t being actively hostile.
The bigger issue that is that neither show nor film really tap into those problems within the Federation in any significant way. Data, the EMH, and the crewman Satie accused got by because they had friends amongst the crew of the Enterprise/Voyager who stood up for them, and supported them. But the wider problems in Starfleet aren’t touched upon. As “Author, Author” touches on, they’re treated as one-off incidents, rather than highlighting underlying problems in the Federation that need addressing.
I cannot see the Federation, after a devastating strike during the Klingon war, capturing a Klingon, then promptly ordering the creation and release of a bioweapon that deliberately targets Klingon genetics; to be released to spread amongst the population to wipe them out.
And yet after Wolf 359, that was exactly what was ordered to be done with Hugh. We know that it likely wouldn’t have worked, given that they accidentally infected Hugh with individuality, and the Collective eventually cut his cube off after the episode, but the intent was for Geordi to create a memetic virus that would target the visual processing of Borg drones and kill them all that way.
But literally every last thing about the story is stream of consciousness, fever dream nonsense, which in any other franchise might be forgiven, but for Star Trek of all things to have such boneheaded threads of anti-science magical thinking, noxious xenophobia and childish cruelty is unforgivable.
Yeah no I totally agree, Final Frontier really is just the worst.
Edit: Yeah I totally get it, I reflexively downvote any reminder that ST:V is canon too.
(lmao why is that image so huge)
But it’s also really going to be hard to argue that ST:V isn’t as-bad-or-worse on pretty much every item (except scope, god beats black hole gun every time) compared to ST:09. 09 wasn’t a great star trek movie, but it was generally mindless fun and it revived interest in the series so we could get good stuff from STD and NSW (and great stuff from LD).
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Yes, you are explaining it perfectly: JJ Abrams MADE MONEY for Paramount. That’s all that matters.
I will give JJ Abrahams one genuine heartfelt compliment about his Star Trek movies: they delivered on the sense of scale.
Particularly the opening scene in the first film, the cinematography (sans overused lens flares) and sound design was excellent and showed both the awesome spectacle of the sheer size of the ships and the awful danger of space combat.
That’s something there wasn’t the budget or technological capability to show until Abrahams-Trek and then Discovery and Strange New Worlds.
Particularly the opening scene in the first film, the cinematography (sans overused lens flares) and sound design was excellent and showed both the awesome spectacle of the sheer size of the ships and the awful danger of space combat.
For their flaws, the Abrams films delivered in visual spectacle.
The intro in the second film, where the Enterprise rises out of the oceans, to the awe of all below, is pretty much one of a very small handful of times where the Enterprise is shown to be quite impressive. It’s a really good show of how a religion could form around it if someone is just a little careless with the prime directive. For its weaknesses, it’s still a cutting-edge Federation starship, with advanced technology beyond our ken.
The first film had the fast-paced nature of Star Trek combat, but it fell into the trap of doing things like Star Wars, by having only warp engines be fast, and keeping a small distance between the ships. Impulse engines can trivially reach a decent fraction of the speed of light (full impulse can go to the moon and back in minutes). They should be no less agile at typical engagement distances.
Have you seen the Expanse? They had to come with narrative excuses to make combat interesting, otherwise it was just lobbing volleys of missiles from thousands of miles away.
The books were so good, they did such a good job with all of the space stuff.
My favorite depiction of the Enterprise is in a fan edit of the Undiscovered Country.
The Constitution class ship isn’t actually that large. It’s 11 decks high, she’s perhaps the size of a naval cruiser. It’s Picard’s Galaxy class ship that’s stupidly huge in size. But they’re both STUPID FUCKING POWERFUL
Roddenberry-era Trek likes to depict starships as moving like seagoing ships. They slowly and ponderously hove around through no apparent means of propulsion. In Star Trek II, Saavik pilot’s the ship out of space dock under 1/4 impulse power, and the ship trundles forward at a good 10 knots or so like a navy ship leaving the wharf.
In the original cut of Undiscovered Country, Kirk orders 1/4 impulse power, and Lt. Valeris quotes regulation at him about thrusters only. II think it’s a holdover from an earlier draft of the script when it was supposed to be Saavik, it might have been an interesting character moment between the two as Saavik had a habit of quoting regulations to Kirk, which he was more willing to tolerate during the training mission depicted in Wrath of Kahn than he is here. But Robin Curtis declined to reprise the role so we get suspiciously similar new chick and it comes off as a boomerific power play between the older Kirk and the younger Valeris.
In this fan cut, the Enterprise HURLS herself through the doors and out of Earth orbit at truly science fiction amounts of speed. Because of course that’s what would happen under 1/4 impulse, those engines can fly the ship at half the speed of light. It makes Kirk look impatient and petulant, like a teenager burning rubber out of the garage because he’s pissed his parents are making him pick up his little brother from choir practice instead of visiting his girlfriend. And Valeris comes off as genuinely concerned for how reckless it is to blast through that small doorway under that amount of power, if filtered through typical Vulcan aloofness.
And it gives you a sense of how sci-fi powerful the Enterprise is, that this relatively small machine packs an amount of power we just don’t have now, that the barest tap on the throttle will huck the damn thing to Pluto, and those are the slow engines!
Abrams*
Abrahamlincolns*
Arby’sms*
hinged rant incoming (this one actually makes sense). not very good (it makes sense), lots of bile and, uh, bile
oh your god don’t get me started on sound design. sound design should be like IT. the only time we should notice it is when it’s AMAZING. like, Baby Driver had amazing sound design. every step lined up with a beat in the music. that kind of amazing. lately you NEED subtitles or you’re going to miss half the dialog. WHAT THE FUCK FILM INDUSTRY?
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For what it’s worth, I found Star Trek dreadfully boring as a child. The trailers for '09 did nothing for me either because it seemed to be all references to a show I didn’t watch. Wasn’t until everyone at school was talking about how fun it was that I finally saw it. I had a blast. It made me want to understand more about the lore. ‘I’d heard about Kirk and Spock my whole life, but who the hell is Bones?’ Etc. Baby-stepped up to Wrath of Khan. ‘Oh wait, this is a sequel to an old episode? Well I gotta see that episode.’ Watched that and found the show way more gripping at an older age, so I went back and did TOS from the beginning. Then on to TNG and so on…
Slop still serves a purpose.
IMO the movies should be movies.
Tone down the world building, the existential messages and social commentary and make something thats more accessable to a wider audience.
Dont fuck with the show, the show is absolutely for all of that.
This is incredibly limiting as a mindset. Movies can absolutely have strong world building, existential messages and social commentary, and also be accessible and entertaining. It’s just that, you have to be a good filmmaker to achieve that.
movies are for
Movies have to be successful at the box office, and star trek movies had to be Hollywood blockbusters. Completely different production environment compared to TV. I don’t see how that can be fixed, and it has nothing to do with being a good filmmaker. How does an outsider come in, write some fancy script shoehorned into a world that they may or may not be good at? For me as a Trekkie, every single star trek movie was a disappointment.
But that they allowed the shitty Abrahams movies to fuck up the series? The very heart and soul of star trek and the federation? Unforgivable. They couldn’t leave the optimistic fantasy of utopia alone. Too philosophical. Not enough profit. Bastards.
Dune is the number one counterexample.
Strong world building, faithful to the source, existential messages in line with with the original material’s philosophy, social commentary that doesn’t pander and respects the audience’s intelligence. And on top of all of that, an academy awarded financial blockbuster.
It’s just that, it takes a good film maker that actually understands and respects the source ethos.
I think we’re talking a bit past each other. Maybe there are stories that work as movies but not as TV, and some that work as TV but not as movies.
I think Star Trek has something inherently episodic with a Starship (or station) traveling the galaxy (or having the galaxy come to them) that does not translate to “lets make an epic movie story”.
The other way it can probably work better. I kinda liked the Dune: Prophecy. It doesn’t really “harm” the movie. Lots of TV shows for star wars too that do not harm the movies.
But a movie coming in an fundamentally altering the world building? For a single blockbuster? Killing Vulcan for epic scene? Great for a movie, sacrilege for the TV show.
None of those movies actually happened so it’s ok
At the time, liked it out of pure desperation for good sci-fi to exist again. As a whole, just a mediocre money-grab with the classic attempt to “appease all audiences” while abandoning the franchise with a parallel universe loophole.
He was right. My GF never liked Star Trek but went “holy fuck!” to the opening of the 2009 movie.
FWIW, Star Trek isn’t the only sci-fi franchise he manages to drive against the wall.
The other big one is known more for action than philosophical discussion. You’d think he’d have been a better fit!
“I didn’t really have a plan for a trilogy” 🤦🤦🤦
We noticed!
Yeah, you would. He’s just that talented a director.
“We don’t like or know the IP and we wrote a script until everyone liked it instead of saying anything because I don’t like philosophy.”
We, the communities, need to start buying IPs of the shit we like before it becomes a target for the mainstream to steal and destroy.
Counterpoint Tony Gilroy who doesn’t like star wars made the best Star wars. So I can’t fully endorse this POV
Jonathan Frakes never watched Star Trek as a kid either. He preferred Bonanza.
The problem with the Kelvin movies is they are all pale imitations of Wrath of Khan. Dude has a problem with Starfleat. Dude enacts revenge. Wrath was a shiny red button you press once. They’ve pressed it four times now and each iteration keeps on getting shittier. As much as I love Star Trek, it’s time to take it off life support. At this point it’s more Weekend at Bernie’s than Let That Be Your Last Battlefield.
It’s difficult to have that conversation without making assumptions about… Things.
But for what it’s worth, ST is still somewhat popcorn in its subject matter.
i have been enjoying SNW. it was a good jumping off point for the larger universe. we finished a season and my wife asked to watch TNG, with the sole prompting of “what do you want to watch next”, so on that basis alone it is a good show
I’m assuming you’re a Trekkie and your wife is the newbie in this situation?
Picking the entry point of a franchise is a huge consideration undertaking. Lots of possibilities.
🌽 Cornrect🌽 . The best type of correct. We’re both in our 40s and her family is a star wars family. I’m a “scifi is cool” person, during the console wars I thought both Sonic and Mario were cool, yknow?
I think so. In that era, I was PC and just knew Microsoft was a bag of dicks.
now working for the white house
Sheldon or the executive branch of the federal government?
(Made sense before they changed “whitehouse” to “white house”)
The only thing good about JJ touching Star Trek was the trailer for it, which is 10/10. The movies were all a big let down in comparison. But the trailer is amazing, in no small part due to the music from Two Steps From Hell.
Wow, longtime trekkie here since original run of TOS. To me the first Kelvin movie was like a birthday present. PERFECT casting for one thing - it felt like watching my old friends’ home movies from before I knew them. What didn’t you like?
I was introduced to Trek as a kid starting with Wrath of Khan and the rest of the films, then TNG which I couldn’t get enough of as a teen. Trek to me was always about philosophical exploration of ideas and moral quandaries, with some action added in for spice. I will admit I probably was skewed in my perception of the original characters because I was introduced to them in feature films where they were already heavily developed and where the characters were midlife and getting older.
I felt like the Kelvin movies went all in on the action and completely abandoned the philosophical core that made Trek special compared to any other space shoot-em-up.
I also felt like the dialogue and script writing was just impossibly bad. The worst example of this was when the commanding officers die and there is this scene where McCoy says something like “We’ve got no captain and no first officer.” And then Kirk just says “Yeah we do” and sits in the chair. I was screaming at my tv in that moment. It was like the writers had no clue what a chain of command was in any sort of military organization or even a civilian vessel. It’s not like the Johnny come lately just says oh man Captain’s dead I guess I’m captain now. Uhh didn’t Spock train him, and therefore probably outranked him at this point? Anyway it just seemed so poorly written and contrived that it completely broke immersion for me when I was already struggling with the plot.
Now that I’ve gotten all of that off my chest, I am glad that as an OG Trekkie you enjoyed it. I’ve noticed in clips I’ve seen from TOS that the show often had a much lighter, whimsical feel compared to the later films and I didn’t really absorb that because I didn’t watch the show, just the films. Maybe the writing and characters matched TOS better than I realized but I was coming at it with a skewed perspective because of what I had / had not watched.
I do agree the casting was pretty good though.
Edit to add: I think what bothered me most was I really like to see character growth and development and the trailer really billed the first movie as Kirk’s growth arc from irresponsible youth to captain. In the actual movie it was like here’s a random circumstance where you can sit in the chair with no substantial growth and now do action-y stuff. I was really hoping it would be more about the character change. I’ll stop now as this has become War and Peace.
I actually liked Beyond. I even bought it on blu-ray. It is, of course, the only one without Abrams as a director, and with minimal involvement by Abrams in general.
The top YT comment on the trailer for the Force Awakens used to be “This is like watching the wedding video after the divorce.”
Wow, you really would struggle to see this in the final product, that is if you had two cells in total to conceive the thought.
