*Spoilers* Star Trek Beyond

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Alex
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*Spoilers* Star Trek Beyond

Post by Alex » Fri Jul 29, 2016 3:52 am

So I finally got around to seeing Star Trek Beyond. I meant to go see it last weekend, but I ended up having to put it off. First off, I'd like to say that I enjoyed it immensely. It was easily the best of the reboot films, though that may not be saying much compared to Into Darkness. I'd love to see what other people thought, as well as discuss some of the various homages and plot points.

But before I do that, I want to say that there will very likely be unmarked spoilers in this thread. If you have not yet seen Star Trek Beyond, then I recommend turning back and getting out to a theater. It was actually pretty good.

Anyway, what do those of you who have seen it think?
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Re: *Spoilers* Star Trek Beyond

Post by Williams » Fri Jul 29, 2016 5:49 pm

Yeah, I saw it yesterday and I really liked it - it felt a lot more like a Star Trek film to me than either of the past two have, but it didn't lose any of the action that they've been relying on to bring new people in - which proves that you can do both and succeed. There were definitely a lot less glaring errors that you could tell they didn't think through (like the whole surprise over the Dreadnought class being able to catch up to Enterprise at warp in Into Darkness, like 'Warp' was a constant speed, or the inter-planetary/system/sector transporter from the same film) - and in fact it felt like they thought through a lot more of it. I did have to go and Google the details of the Franklin to see where that would fit within the timeline, but even the official explanation of that (aside from the registry number, which was picked as it was Leonard Nimoy's birthday) makes a lot of sense to me.

To be honest, it actually made me start thinking about looking for an AU sim again. I also thought that Starbase Yorktown looked really cool, though a part of me did have to step aside for a minute and say 'hang on... if in the AU they're able to build a giant snow globe city for a space station, why are we in the Prime universe still sticking to the century-old Stardock class?'.

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Re: *Spoilers* Star Trek Beyond

Post by Emily » Sat Jul 30, 2016 10:04 pm

Okay, I just got back from the theater and I have to say Beyond was my favorite of all the three. As Matt said, I think they really mastered both elements to the movie - the Trek-esque story with some good action sprinkled into it. I thought that all the actors did a really good job with their roles, although I kind of found Jaylah to be a bit annoying at times. And actually, I didn't realize this until my friend pointed it out after the movie, but this is the first time that the Enterprise has truly been destroyed. In Generations the Enterprise's saucer was in tact and in Nemesis the engineering section was still there. The entire ship in Beyond was destroyed, even the saucer on the planet. I kind of think that it isn't plausible for the ship to have saucer separation capabilities, although it was kind of a neat touch.

The Franklin was done really well, in my opinion. It looked like it actually could predate the NX-01, but the tech inside still looked Abramsverse - which is understandable. I'm not going to pick apart everything here, but I did really enjoy the Yorktown space station. The idea of it as sort of a "snow globe" (as Bones put it) or like a mini planet was really intriguing. It did kind of feel like a Death Star with a good Trek-twist. When Krall flew his three swarm fighters into it, I really got the Death Star feel to it.

Overall, I really enjoyed the movie. The plot was excellent and it was very well executed. Definitely would recommend it!

EDIT: Okay, I just realized how much this movie felt like Guardians of the Galaxy...or am I just crazy?

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Re: *Spoilers* Star Trek Beyond

Post by Alex » Sun Jul 31, 2016 7:06 am

I think the Enterprise was pretty thoroughly destroyed in Search for Spock. I suppose we only really saw part of the saucer explode, but she appeared to have burned up on reentry. Even if part of her crashed intact, she was most certainly destroyed when Genesis exploded. The Enterprise E only lost part of the leading edge of the saucer. Most of the ship was intact. Regardless, we never saw one of our leading ships so thoroughly trashed. It was a bit of a curbstomp, which was a little disappointing that our girl didn't get to put up more of a fight, though the Enterprise did get the last laugh by taking out one of the people responsible for her death.

I actually liked the fact that they had the saucer separate. It was established in TOS that the Enterprise was capable of such a maneuver in an emergency. Kirk told Scotty to prepare to separate the saucer. I read an article somewhere that the intention was to separate the saucer in an emergency, and even had landing gear for the saucer. The two dark gray triangles on the underside of the saucer were supposed to be the feet. A third was under the neck. This way the saucer could make an emergency landing. It wasn't meant to be a standard procedure though, and reintegration would have required the aid of a drydock, unlike the Enterprise D. They probably could have got away with just having the saucer crash with that little bit of the neck still attached. Simon Pegg was one of the writers, and he probably included that as a homage to that scene in TOS.

I do agree that Yorktown makes the stardock class look very old. It was certainly an interesting design.

I disagree about Jaylah. I thought she was a great character. I don't know if anyone involved would be interested in having her, but I wouldn't mind seeing her in a starfleet uniform and taking over the navigator's position. It wouldn't be the same as Chekov, but since we know he won't be recast, someone will have to sit next to Sulu. Speaking of Chekov, I was glad to see that he had a pretty good sized part in this film, especially the action scenes when he was running around with Kirk. It was heartrending at the end to see him centered on the screen when Kirk toasted "to absent friends". I tried to stay strong, but someone must have started cutting some onions in the row behind me.

I thought the way they honored Leonard Nimoy was very touching. I read that Zachary Quinto channeled his own emotions for those scenes since the two of them had grown very close. I loved seeing the picture of the prime crew, though it did raise the question about why Spock Prime had it since he would have had to have had it with him during his mission to stop the Hobus shockwave. But then I read something that made it even more touching. One theory is that Spock was very likely the only living member of the original Enterprise crew. Scotty would have had the best shot at still being alive, but since Hobus was many, many years after "Relics", it's possible that he had already passed. That means that Spock probably carried that photo with him everywhere he went, as a reminder of his shipmates. It's no wonder in made the young Spock want to stay in Starfleet. Spock Prime clearly cared very much for that crew, or else he wouldn't have had that photo on him. He had no way of knowing that he wouldn't be returning home.

The time lapse of the Enterprise A construction felt a little out of place, but at the same time was pretty neat to see. It went by so fast that it was hard for me to catch everything, but there were some subtle differences between the Enterprise A and the first Enterprise. I think the secondary hull shape was a little different, but most notably to me was that the nacelles did not have the steep curve like the other one, but instead extended at a sharper angle like on the original Prime Enterprise. I would love to find some pictures of it to better compare the two Kelvin timeline Enterprises.
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Re: *Spoilers* Star Trek Beyond

Post by Williams » Sun Jul 31, 2016 10:45 am

One other thing I remember liking quite a bit about the film, was that at the start it addresses something which rarely is in Trek (aside from to a degree Voyager, but that doesn't really count here); the psychological effect of the loneliness of space travel. Even on a ship with so many crew, being out in space for three years with only them, no return home, and just largely monotonous routine would really have an effect on you, and they showed that really well with Kirk getting disillusioned by it all right near the start. It's an interesting aspect of it to look at, and it makes the crew (in this case, the captain in particular) feel a lot more human.

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Re: *Spoilers* Star Trek Beyond

Post by Stannes » Mon Aug 01, 2016 1:49 am

I liked it. There was very much a 'team feel' instead of the Kirk show and that was very welcome. Rhimer laughed at me because I was holding my cheeks through the whole drones evisceration scene saying 'ow, ow, the ship..' but other than that, it was pretty good. I wish that the bad guy had a stronger presence on screen. He was bad, but not the sort that you just desperately require his demise in order to be satisfied. The crew characterization was really nice and it made me long for good, tight knit ensemble games again. Also.. went looking for AU sims. I found one and it was a 'play the character from the movie' sim. Not my cup of tea. If anyone finds one, let me know.
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Re: *Spoilers* Star Trek Beyond

Post by Alex » Mon Aug 01, 2016 4:58 am

I'm surprised Rhimer was making fun of you for feeling for the ship. I feel like losing the nacelles like that could be akin to someone cutting off your legs. As spectacular as it the 'battle' looked, I always had a stronger emotional response to the Enterprise's destruction in Search for Spock and the Enterprise D in Generations. The latter doesn't make as much sense looking back at it now, but I was fairly young when that movie came out. The Enterprise D was my Enterprise, the one that I grew up with. Seeing her destroyed was tough for me as a kid. My dad tried to reassure me that they only did it so that they could make a new one for the next movie, but at the time it was still pretty tough. Even seeing Kirk die (twice!) didn't affect me as much as seeing the Enterprise destroyed in that film. This one didn't resonate with me the same way, but then I'm also older and I never felt the same way about this ship as I did the others. Still, I was feeling for Kirk as he stared out his escape pod window at the saucer crashing on the planet below him.

I really liked that sequence at the beginning talking about life on a five year mission. I don't recall the shows really addressing that. Of course TNG the crew had their families on the ship, and to some extent so did DS9, so it's hard to really get into that. But during those scenes of Kirk considering staying on the station, all I could think was "Don't let them promote you. Don't let them do anything to get you off the bridge of that ship. Because while you're there, you can make a difference."
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Re: *Spoilers* Star Trek Beyond

Post by Emily » Mon Aug 01, 2016 7:58 am

For me, the most heartbreaking thing in Trek was seeing Voyager crash land on the planet in timeless. Just watching it crash down and tear apart was hard for me to watch, and then seeing the crew dead and frozen on the bridge made me cry. :(

I cringed when I saw the ship torn apart in Beyond, well, when I wasn't focusing on how cool of an idea the drone swarm was. Because, if you think about it, those little things must be able to travel really darn fast to get from their planet, through the nebula, and to Yorktown that fast. I mean, for little fighters in that era. Correct me if I'm wrong, but we really didn't see warp shuttles until TNG. Or, maybe Yorktown was just really close to the nebla? Although, that'd be kind of silly - having a station with millions of people positioned so close to something that could be hostile.

One thing that I'm just thinking about now is the fact that Kirk applied for the Vice Admiral "position" on Yorktown. From what I've always gathered, promotions are usually given, not requested. If they think you're right for the position, they'll ask you. Sort of how like Riker was always looked at for command, he never applied for it. And, Kirk really jumps through the ranks quickly, if you think about it. Going all the way up to a Captain (I forget what he was in the 2009 movie before he was given the rank of Captain, but regardless it was pretty crazy) and then to be able to take on a Vice Admiral rank/position in your 40s (I'd guess)? Pretty unbelievable, to me.
Williams wrote:One other thing I remember liking quite a bit about the film, was that at the start it addresses something which rarely is in Trek (aside from to a degree Voyager, but that doesn't really count here); the psychological effect of the loneliness of space travel. Even on a ship with so many crew, being out in space for three years with only them, no return home, and just largely monotonous routine would really have an effect on you, and they showed that really well with Kirk getting disillusioned by it all right near the start. It's an interesting aspect of it to look at, and it makes the crew (in this case, the captain in particular) feel a lot more human.
Just to touch on this briefly...I agree that they did a good job of showing the stress and emotion of being alone in space. Reading your comment made me think of the DS9 episode Valiant, with those annoying cadets. That one ops officer/medic who missed her home. I remember the Captain and XO telling Jake that when you wear the uniform, there's a sense of duty that you need to focus on. Maybe that masks some of what we see? I think that the main reason we really didn't see it much in any of the series was because ships and bases could actually take on families. Take Sulu in Beyond as an example. He had a husband and a kid who were living on Yorktown. That family would be able to live happily on the Enterprise-D or on DS9 with the facilities that the they had. Maybe Enterprise could have done a better job with showing that kind of emotion, but I don't really think that it would have been an issue for TNG/DS9.

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Re: *Spoilers* Star Trek Beyond

Post by Stannes » Mon Aug 01, 2016 7:46 pm

The whole plot surrounding the Search for Spock and the end of the movie prior was difficult on me when I saw it Alex. I think I was about six when I'd decided that I was going to marry Spock and then my gran was apt to push any Trek book in my hand that I could find, so by the time I saw it I already knew David and Saavik. The entire movie became a what-the-ever-loving is this?! Dot in some anxiety and viola: I was rather upset through the movie. Also, I never married Spock. But Rhimer is a good fit.
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