...or how I learned to stop worrying and have come to meh the JJ-Verse.
OK, folks... it's been a while, I admit, but I have to get something out there.
The Crazed American is a Star Trek fantatic. I loved the Original Series, loved The Next Generation, Loved DS9, tolerated Voyager, found Enterprise to be every hit or miss. In terms of Star Trek Movies, I loved 1-6, tolerated 7, loved 8-9, disliked 10 (Nemesis). 2009's Star Trek (directed by JJ Abrams) I enjoyed.
That brings us to the most recent iteration: 2013's Star Trek Into Darkness. Big, loud expensive. Great cast and good effects wasted on a, frankly, dumbed down and derivative story. I enjoyed seeing it in IMAX 3D, letting my senses get battered into submission. It was pretty. Dumb, but pretty.
Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982, Directed by Nicholas Meyer) is, not only my favorite Star Trek movie, it is my favorite movie. Full Stop. This "homage" (read: rehash) to TWoK is, the more I think about it, galling. You've taken the effort and literally spent hundreds of millions of dollars at this point "rebooting" the Star Trek Franchise with an exciting, great cast, and still all you can come up with is a rehash of a better movie with about 1/10th the budget?? The only saving grace has been the idea of it all being an alternate universe - giving crazies like me the fictional excuse to not really care what is happening in the new movies.
So, I have been trying to find a sum up of the Star Trek Prime Universe. Last thing we heard was from the events of the 2009 Star Trek move. Ambassador Spock entered the alternate universe in a fancy Jellyfish like ship (apparently designed by Commander Geordi LaForge and maybe Wesley Crusher), after apparently being involved with the destruction of Romulus.
So with no Romulus, galactic politics in the Prime Universe is mighty different. Ever since the events of the poorly received Star Trek: Nemesis, the Romulan Empire was on the ropes. The Reman Insurrection had eliminated the Romulan Senate, and the empire was disintegrating. Former Romulan colonies and protectorates undoubtedly either band together, or begin pestering the Federation directly for membership. The Federation would have to be on the ball to keep the Klingon Empire from immediately invading, although after the casualties incurred during the Dominion War, the Klingons might not be too quick on the forever war.
Things are mighty interesting in the Alpha Quadrant. There are 100,000 stories that could start with the previous two paragraphs. And we are stuck with a convoluted, silly, rehash of something done better 31 years before???
Roberto Orci, one of the writers of both of the new Star Trek movies will apparently be directing the next 2016 Star Trek movie. My advice and request: do something new - you're 240 r so years in the future - you have an FTL Starship and a legendary crew at your command, you're in outer space - find a new story to tell!
Tell me I'm wrong?
Crazed American, out.
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