He seems to have mellowed slightly, and he makes some good points with aspects of the film, although I have issues with others, particularly his continued inability to recognise that this is not Star Trek as it's been for 40-odd years.
So what if it's got different themes? For that matter how are destiny and free will irrevocably in opposition to each other. Abrams' films have never claimed that everyone has a predestined role in life, but that they (specifically Kirk) have the potential to be more than they've achieved thus far. STID in particular shows a Kirk who hasn't been forged by the experience of Tarsus and the Farragut developing into the individual we know he can become.It tried hard to relay the message of Gene Roddenberry, but failed to do so on several accounts, most notably because it evoked the concept of destiny, as opposed to free will...The crew's destinies are explicitly said to be predetermined once again, from the person who would least claim that in the Prime Universe. STID just begs to be compared with the Prime Universe, and so I will not spare the movie of my criticism that it does not adhere to all the standards laid down in the over 40 years of Star Trek that came before the Abramsverse, the technical ones (canon), the look and feel, as well as the philosophy.
The nonsense about the technology and the "look and feel" has already been discussed and dismissed often enough and long enough that we don't need to go into it again.
Good point, although we've seen that transporters in the Abramsverse are a lot iffier than in the Geneverse, and everyone was obviously keen to minimise use of high technology around the natives (to the extent of Kirk and McCoy using native transportation).Seriously, even if the Enterprise were built for it, why in the world does Kirk hide his 700m ship (if we believe in the official scale) in the ocean, against Scotty's explicit concerns regarding the corrosive salt water, when he could just stay in orbit, beam up and down and launch shuttles much more easily? The whole stunt was inserted into the story merely for a cheap "wow" effect and against all reason.
Kirk going from cadet to Captain in a bout five minutes was certainly the weakest part of XI, but here its less of an issue, as one of the central themes was Kirk growing up a bit as a result of being slapped round the head with the consequences of his gung-ho attitude.Actually, the whole sequence of events is familiar from the previous movie: Kirk is on trial and/or is demoted for a comparably minor offense in the beginning. Then Pike, the captain of the Enterprise, is disabled (or dead this time), so Kirk takes command of the ship. And he stays in command in the end in spite of his previously attested immaturity. This pattern is the same in both movies, and it doesn't become more plausible by just being repeated.
On the contrary, how to eliminate Khan always had an easy answer: fire torpedoes, kill him, job done (at least as far as everyone knew at the time). The real question was whether to eliminate him.And it loses sight of the actual mission. We've got: the mysterious torpedoes that can't be opened or scanned in any fashion; a villain who is hiding on Qo'noS and who could be eliminated by those torpedoes (in real life: attack drones); a Starfleet admiral who wants Kirk to use these and only these torpedoes; an attractive female officer who is unexpectedly assigned to the crew and who poses as an expert for these torpedoes; Kirk's crew members who almost unanimously protest against the use of these torpedoes. Scotty even requests to be released of duty because of them, which Kirk -unexpectedly for Scotty- agrees to. The crew's skepticism about the torpedoes only seems to make sense in hindsight, as prudent foresight. I find it quite distracting that everything revolves around the nature of these plot devices, rather than the question how to eliminate Harrison.
And lobbing a few dozen torpedoes at the planet from across the neutral zone is an improvement is it? For someone who has a go at the new films for allegedly departing from the spirit of Star Trek Bernd's being a bit bloodthirsty here.The solution to try to apprehend Harrison, rather than killing him, turns out a stupid mistake because you don't try to land on Qo'noS with a civilian ship and honestly expect to survive this stunt.
Yet another complaint about look and feel, completely ignoring the fact that this is not, and has never been depicted as, the Geneverse.To add insult to injury, the chase scene with the Klingon ships through the very un-Klingon abandoned city looks much more like Star Wars than Star Trek, and Harrison eliminates the Klingons much like in a superhero movie. Agreed, he does have supernatural forces as will be explained later, but it doesn't feel like Star Trek at all.
Did it somehow escape Bernd's notice that the Klingons were shooting at them while Khan was saving their necks?Also, I think it is quite hypocritical that the Klingons, with whom Kirk and his people have no business, are slaughtered by the dozen, while Harrison gets a chance to surrender. Sure, the Klingons would never surrender, but it is highly unethical to cause so much collateral damage apprehending just a single man, which is just one more reason why Kirk should have used the torpedoes, or any other weapons that would kill just Harrison. Or perhaps he could have asked the Klingons in advance to do the job for him?
Sulu had already told him that the Big E had long-range torpedoes locked onto him, and ordered him to surrender. He therefore knew that the Enterprise had some of his toys, and Kirk himself told him that they had all 72.The question why Harrison was so sure that the he would be arrested, rather than killed, and why he was so sure that Marcus would equip the Enterprise with his torpedoes, and all 72 of them, remains unanswered anyway.
To a certain extent that's true, but I think the plot did a decent job of justifying his use.In the following it is revealed that Harrison is actually Khan. But this revelation has no impact on the story; it is just a message to the audience, "Look, this is still Star Trek. We've even got Khan for you." The fact that it's Khan, the generally accepted Savior of the Star Trek Franchise, remains utterly gratuitous for the rest of the movie.
On the contrary, it explained clearly that Khan wanted revenge on Marcus for using him, and for what he believed was the death of his crew.Actually, his reason for revenge is a weak one, compared to the one of Khan 1.0 in "Star Trek II". STID enters a direct competition with the classic, and while Cumberbatch is absolutely convincing in showing Khan's attitude, the story fails to provide him with the strong motivation of having been exiled to a desert planet.
Because Marcus was holding the fate of his crew over him. This was made pretty explicit.It doesn't really explain either why Khan allowed himself to become a minion of Marcus.
I'm in too minds about this sequence. On the one hand, I can see what Abrams was trying to do - closely echo the greatest scene in Trek history, while giving it a new meaning by showing Kirk's understanding of the importance of cold logic (and thereby echo Spock's preparedness to sacrifice his own life in the volcano at the start of the film) and Spock admitting that he does have emotions, and does consider Kirk his friend, not just his commanding officer. On the other hand I felt it fell flat, partially because it was obvious to me (if not to Bernd) that it was going to cut and paste large chunks of the script from TWoK, partially because it came in the middle of the film's climax, unlike TWoK, and partially because there was obviously no chance of Kirk staying dead, and the film had already signalled clearly that Khan's blood would be use to revive him.But with the scene in which Kirk saves the tumbling ship by restarting the reactor the movie has lost me. As already mentioned, I avoided reading spoilers, and therefore I was not prepared for STID totally ripping off Spock's death scene from "Star Trek II", only with switched roles. I anticipated what would follow as soon as Kirk and Scotty were standing in front of that glass door in engineering. I yawned. But it was still a shock that the sequence of events was exactly the same as in "Star Trek II", even the words that Kirk and Spock exchange and the hands on both sides of the glass pane. After the initial shock I couldn't help but giggle, followed by loud laughter. It was so bad, I couldn't help but to laugh it away. My girl-friend says it was embarrassing, and perhaps I should be sorry for disturbing the supposedly most emotional scene of the movie in such an inappropriate fashion. But seriously: What the hell where they thinking? That it would be a nice homage? If this was the intention, it has gone completely awry. The way STID repeats the events of "Star Trek II" (or rather, pre-enacts them) certainly doesn't harm the original movie. But it turns STID and ultimately the whole Abramsverse into a cheap rip-off that taps into the original instead of trying to find its own way.
Congratulations Bernd - you've picked up on one of the central themes of the film.Characters & acting Well, I can't really say much about Kirk in this movie, other than that he makes many decisions (some of which he has to revise) and engages in reckless maneuvers (some of which end up in even more chaos). In my impression Kirk, even rather than Khan, is the unstable element in the story.
He's had time to come to terms with the loss of his mother and his planet, which he handled about as well as anyone would expect last time (i.e. badly, including beating the crap out of Kirk). On top of this, the complaint ignores one of the main themes, of Spock learning to avoid bottling up his emotions so much, which was highlighted earlier in the film with the discussion with Uhura and Kirk in the shuttle.I don't think that it's plausible that Spock can rather live with the loss of his home planet (which is only a side note this time) and of his mother, while the fight against an enemy like Khan provokes such an irate reaction in him ("Khaaan!").
The accent could do with some work though, unless he wants to threaten Dick Van Dyke's reputation.The development of Scotty's character is a pleasant surprise in STID. The humor surrounding everything he is doing and saying is toned down to a more appropriate level. His arguably greatest scene is when he asks to be relieved of duty, more like a hollow threat, and Kirk surprisingly accepts his request. The way Simon Pegg plays Scotty's reaction is priceless. It seems I have to revise my opinion from the first movie on this casting choice and I look forward to seeing him next time.
Given Bernd's previous, I'm actually pretty impressed that he's managed to restrain this nonsense, although I suppose it would be too much to hope that he'd got his head round the fact that this is not the Geneverse, and is therefore not constrained by its aesthetics.The engineering of the Enterprise is still as ugly and inappropriately factory-like as already in "Star Trek (2009)". I wouldn't really have expected that to change, but except for a few less water pipes that were visible the whole set still cries "brewery". I like the industrial look of the huge warp core, which strikes me as very realistic, although it has nothing in common with anything we have seen in Star Trek so far. The arguably most questionable design choice is the Vengeance, which not only has a name that is unbecoming of a Starfleet ship but is also as huge and ugly as no Federation vessel ever seen on Star Trek. As much as I hate this abomination of a starship, I think I could set aside my anger about it but only because I was prepared to see it.
It was made clear that Khan had been found and employed some time before the events of XI - the destruction of Vulcan simply gave Marcus the political impetus he needed to turn his plans for the Vengeance into reality.It took just one year since the destruction of Vulcan for the following to happen: Khan's ship is found adrift in space. Marcus enlists Khan's help to develop a huge starship and all kinds of weapons. The starship is built and launched. This is absolutely ridiculous.
It was a rather large plot point that he failed to keep the purpose of those torps secret.So Khan built those torpedoes, and he managed to keep the interior a total secret? How would he explain the empty space that he designed just large enough to hold the cryonic chambers? Agreed, he may have claimed it was for extra explosive charges, but it seems extremely unlikely that he could really keep the secret.
This is something called "consistency". It is to be praised, not criticised, that the interstellar transporter didn't simply disappear into some warehouse like the Ark of the Covenant.Khan transports himself to Qo'noS, using Scotty's "transwarp transport" formula. This was already utterly incredible in "Star Trek (2009)", but instead of admitting their error and abandoning the idea, the writers repeat and thereby corroborate it.
Consistent with the very high speed of warp from Earth to Vulcan in XI.Well, and the Enterprise needs less than a day to travel to Qo'noS and back as well.
Really? I didn't know Bernd had a degree in starship engineering.After the extreme structural damage, the Enterprise is definitely only fit for scrap. Well, maybe it is actually a new ship in the end, but the impression is created it is still the same Enterprise (only with some modifications to the warp and impulse engines).
Excellent point, and one of the biggest plot holes in the film. It's possible that since McCoy had conducted his initial experiment with Khan's blood he didn't want to take the chance that the others had different properties.Why does McCoy need Khan's blood to cure Kirk? Couldn't he simply revive one of Khan's people, who likely have a suited blood composition too, especially considering that he needs one of their cryogenic chambers for Kirk anyway?
McCoy was clear that Kirk needed to be frozen fast to prevent irreversible brain damage. Since he didn't realise the effects of Khan's blood before, he wouldn't have taken this precaution with other fatalities. There's also the issue that repairing radiation damage would be a bit different from reversing fatal physical injuries, or long exposure to vacuum.It looks like McCoy saves only Kirk's life using Khan's blood. What about all the other people who were fatally injured during the attacks? Is it the captain's prerogative? Where could he possibly draw a line, considering that Khan is a blood bank that could be tapped for the benefit of humanity?
