My
family and I saw the latest installment of the post-JJ Abrams Star Trek movie
the other day and I must admit that I was pretty excited to watch a Star Trek
film as much as I anticipate any other Star Wars sequel. I was an ardent fan of
the original Shatner/Nimoy films and TV series and I was mighty impressed with
the way JJ Abrams rebooted the franchise. With all of these in mind, I was
expecting a heck of a ride from Star Wars Beyond.
Let
me first start by saying that I was rather excited to hear that Simon Pegg was
one of the writers for ‘Beyond. I’ve always imagined him as the British Kevin
Smith and in my opinion it was a matter of time really before he gets to write
the screenplay for either Star Wars or Star Trek. There’s the thing. When you
rope in a funny man to write a screen play there are bound to be some humor and
light-hearted moments in the film. This is fact.
For instance, the beginning of the film reminded me a whole lot of Tim Allen’s Galaxy Quest which coincidently is a parody of the whole Star Trek film franchise. Seriously I refrained myself from laughing (too hard) when I saw that the ‘threatening’ alien-monsters were actually minnow in size compared to Kirk.
Almost immediately after being saved from the ‘monsters’ James T. Kirk went into his usual inner monologue mode and began talking on how their 3rdyear from a 5-year journey into space had become more like ‘episodes’ from a sitcom i.e. repetitious/monotonous routines in their daily lives on board of the USS Enterprise. This act of breaking the 4th wall is evident when Kirk commented on how he had to wear the same yellow-colored shirt every single day in space.
On
a more serious note, Kirk began questioning his life motives and began mulling
with the idea to leave the helm of the Enterprise for a (get this)…..desk job?
Now, that’s some serious career changing decision he’s got there! I think the
producers did a good job in portraying Kirk’s more sensitive side here.
The
mind-boggling alternate universe/timeline first introduced in the first
Abrams-led film continues where we got to know of the death of Ambassador Spock
(compete with a Leonard Nimoy image eulogy) I like the part where they showed a
picture of the ‘alternate universe’ crew of the USS Enterprise in a photo from
the ‘alternate’ Spock’s stash of personal belongings. Nostalgic feeling evoked.
Checked.
I like it that Chekov gets more screen time in ‘Beyond. His longer than usual survival-mode screen time on the planet with Kirk serves as a touching tribute to Anton Yelchin and there was that tribute at the end for him. Sad news indeed because we just got to see how Chekov’s character develops in the movie and we shall never get to see how Chekov is going to turn up in the next (confirmed) sequel of Star Trek. I’d like to see where the producers take the character next. Will they kill the character off or would they take another actor to replace Yelchin? We’ll find out sometime soon.
Great to hear a ‘classic’ track in the form of Beastie Boys’ Sabotage playing in the movie. Wonder if they’ll continue to use more ‘classic’ tracks in the upcoming movie?
One more thing before I sign off, is it just me, or the character Jaylah felt like Abrams’ ‘Rey’ for the Star Trek universe? A lone female, surviving and wandering alone on a deserted (albeit not a desert) planet? The similarities are there I tell ‘ya.
Overall, I think Beyond was a tad better than Into Darkness although many fans of Benedict Cumberbatch might sneer me for this statement. It was a blend of good ‘ol Star Trek goodness and some good fun humour courtesy of Simon Pegg being one of the writer for the film. Will I watch it again? Yes but I’ll probably wait till the blu ray comes out.
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