Wrath of Khan and associated awesome
Want to gush about Star Trek 2? You can do it! Yeah baby!
It would have been a much better movie if they'd kept the ending closed. Imagine this being the death of Spock?
Or if you do not like the film, you may bash it as well. But this thread is intended for general Star Trek 2 discussion, and/or discussion of ST: Into Darkness.
...And we're off!
Why not?Originally Posted by Spooniest
there's only so much you can discuss about one film without branching into the other stuff - especially when it comes to Trek.
No, this should not have been the death of Spock. Whilst I agree the impact might've been greater we still had 4+ films to go and they would have been absolutely lifeless without Spock. Star Trek IV especially.
Kirk, Spock, and McCoy are the heart and soul of TOS and I don't think it would've worked half as well with one of those pieces missing.
I am not a star trek fine. I never liked any of the series, and really only enjoyed TNG movies of the franchise. The exception to this is Wrath of Kahn, which is amazing and I absolutely love that movie.
Wrath of Khan is the greatest Star Trek movie of all time.
And Gene Roddenberry absolutely hated the idea.
As much as I respect Gene Roddenberry Tori, a lot of good Trek involved things he wouldn't have liked, and/or after he stepped down as the man in charge.
Yeah, I'm with Vivi. I love, LOVE and respect Gene Roddenberry for bringing us Trek.
But.
As someone who has watched the entirety of TOS, all the worst episodes were the ones where he was really directly involved. Doing all the screenwriting or having complete story control and so forth. He was good as an idea guy but lord almighty the worst episodes were the ones with his stamp all over them. I know it might be blasphemy to say, but... it's true.
(See also: Star Trek: The Motion Picture)
((In fairness to him he did de-canonize Star Trek V, though, so we should give him a lot of credit for that. And he also did write the TNG ep where Wesley got stabbed through the heart. Okay, maybe he's better than I'm admitting))
Yes, I agree wholly, Roddenberry had a superb ability to come up with a setting and milieu, but he did not belong anywhere near the director's chair.
I'd say he's a big part of why I find the first two TNG seasons to be the weakest overall as well. If I'm not mistaken, the torch was largely passed over to Rick Berman starting with season 3.
Yes that's correct.
Roddenberry was totally against the idea of killing Spock, so much so to the point where he leaked the script to try to get fans in an uproar about it. The death scene originally occurred about halfway through the movie, and because of the leak, they had to push it all the way to the end of the film.
So completely by accident, Roddenberry made it a better film. But his memos for that and the next 5 Trek films went largely ignored.
Gene Roddenberry was, I understand, ardently opposed to character development and story arcs. Hence why, among other changes, Saavik was re-written into Valeris for Star Trek VI. We can't have an established character do something new, unexpected and disturbing now, can we?
That said, Star Trek II is awesome. Nicholas Meyer's direction was a perfect fit, and the story is solid despite relying on a one-episode guest villain from the original series. The themes of aging, death and new life tie together nicely, and have remained resonant with me, especially as I get older.
While some people whine about it, I personally like that Kirk and Khan never confront each other face-to-face in this film. It's a nice break from the usual. After all, how many action films have we seen where the script might as well say "then the hero and the villain HIT EACH OTHER WITH THEIR HANDS until the villian dies!"
Speaking of whining, let's briefly address Star Trek Into Darkness. I understand the popular criticisms of it, but despite them I still find it a blast of an action/adventure movie. I tend to treat it as as series of balls-to-the-wall action set-pieces, based firmly in the modern re-imagining of the Star Trek universe. Benedict Cumberbatch's Khan is equal parts calculating, passionate and ferocious, and the role suits him oddly well. So, he's not ethnic Indian? Neither was Ricardo Montalban. Besides, there are plenty of white people in India, and on top of that Khan was genetically engineered, so he's likely got traits from all over the world. Into Darkness, I find, is one of those films where the True FansTM will go out of their way to find things to be angry about on the internet, rather than accepting it for what it is. Certainly, the movie's not without it flaws, but claiming it's the "worst Trek movie ever!" or that it "literally raped my childhood!" is petty, juvenile hyperbole.
Back to Wrath of Khan again: damned good film - both thematically and visually, it has stood the test of time well over the last three decades. A worthy DVD or blu-ray purchase, especially if you can get the director's cut which is only fractionally longer, but adds some surprising twists, turns and extra depth.
:Edit: plus, there's Nicholas Meyer's commentary track, which is cool. Dude pulls no punches, espcially when it comes to William Shatner
I know. I can just never resist the irony of pointing out when the creator seems to be his creation own worst enemy. We would have gotten time travelers assassinating JFK as the second movie if they didn't boot him off the movie projects after the first film tanked.
I'm not too bothered by the absence of story arcs in TOS. That was something I actually liked about the original series, you could jump in at just about any episode and get the full enjoyment out of it.
I immensely enjoyed Into Darkness and the first Trek film of the reboot. I thought Into Darkness was a huge step up from its predecessor, the only time I rolled my eyes was when they squeezed in that famous Wrath of Khan line at the beginning but when the movie was doing its own thing it was at its best.
I love the story of how he submitted a re-write to Shatner after a disastrous first script meeting with him ("This script is a DISASTER!" he reportedly said), and then, when Shatner read through the re-write, he called and left a message on Meyer's answering machine (remember those?) saying "You're a genius, this script is great, blah blah blah.":Edit: plus, there's Nicholas Meyer's commentary track, which is cool. Dude pulls no punches, espcially when it comes to William Shatner
Nick Meyer is fond of saying that he took that tape and said "I'm never getting rid of this."
I agree with you! I thought it was a great movie, I just don't get all the fan hate going on. I argued with some guys over at another website till I was green in the face, but some people think they're experts on film because they sit around watching Star Trek all the time...(shrug).
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
