Review of Star Trek Beyond (2016) by Patrick S — 26 Dec 2016

I have mixed emotions about STB. It is, like so many other sci-fi and action-adventure movies nowadays, awash in stunning CGI locations (perhaps that is at the heart of my consternation - it is like so many other sci-fi and action-adventure movies). The production quality and the acting really are top shelf, which is why I'm so frustrated, because it seems all that talent (on and behind the screen) are wasted by the writers. The problem I had with this movie is that it lacks almost everything that should hold a movie - particularly a Star Trek movie - together.

First off - a good story (all things being equal) should set two characters that have opposing goals squarely in front of each other (so to speak) and let the conflict fly. Krull and Kirk (and crews) are just on opposite sides of a yet to be declared war, and even after the movies explains why the bad guy, Krull, is so bent on punishing the Federation, I still really have no idea why. It's like we've been dropped in on a playground and one kid punches the other and we don't know why, but we have to sit and watch the brawl that ensues. And... since we've spent the entire movie not knowing, it feels like "what does it matter at this point" when Krull's motives are revealed. I just leave his whole storyline thinking they had a grand stage with which to make a profound statement about the nature of terrorism (which is what it is) and they don't. Too bad.

Next is the problem of series movies. When the supporting characters (in this instance Jaylah) are more interesting than the main characters, you have a problem. Before seeing the movie, I anticipated Jaylah was going to be the "bad guy" because of her prominence on ad material - I don't recall ever seeing Krull anywhere! She's smart, tough, funny (what is fast becoming the trend of Hollywood - the woman action hero because we need to demonstrate gender equity) and the rest of the cast (Scotty being my only exception) seem to be groaning under the weight of their collective angst by comparison. She's lost someone (a bunch of someones, which Scotty points out), but it doesn't crush her like all the storyline baggage seems to do for the rest of our cast.

I really felt like this show was going to finally get beyond (see what I did there) the nostalgia for the original series, but perhaps Nemoy's passing was just too great a thing for the production crew to pass up. Spock has cast such a long shadow on this rebook, the whole thing is becoming an ongoing homage to him and him alone. Nemoy has been the through line of so many Star Trek iterations, and was a constant high light, so I feel bad saying this, but it's time to move on.

Sulu's gayness... I just think it was a completely fruitless insertion into the series. If Takei doesn't like it, why do it? It was too much for fans who knew what it was (a forced, if limp, foray into gay friendliness) and too little to add any serious heft to the story line (it's not like there was anything at all beyond a picture and a hug that gave us emotional connection to these add-ons, let alone explain how Sulu got connected with them or what they were doing in deep space.) The whole thing was misguided and poorly executed. Now all future movies are saddled with this bad choice (unless they explain it away as Sulu's brother or some such, which they could given the complete lack of anything).

Next... I feel like once Patrick Stewart said "plenty of more letters in the alphabet" the ships have become throw-away props. I hope future movies (of course they'll keep making them now) realize that the ships are as much a character in these stories (Millennium Falcon - Hello!) as the people. That being said, at least the interiors of the Enterprise looks like a ship in this film and not a brewery or baggage handling facility.

The whole reboot has not known what to do with Bones. In the first Abrams movies, he was witty and his sequence with getting Kirk sick to get him on board the Enterprise was great, but beyond that he's been like a dislocated appendage. He spends more time as a pilot (a pilot! the man who didn't even want to go into space can be a pilot!?) than he does being a doctor. Maybe we're into pet peeve area here, but have we ever even seen sick bay in the reboots? Another problem with series movies - you almost have to write something for everyone and (as Uhura and Chekov can also testify about), you can't have something for everyone. Too bad.

Lastly, a couple of irritating things that maybe I shouldn't think too much about in this kind of movie. Where did all those "bee" ships come from? Attacking the station, it's like there are billions of them, but there is nothing beyond a throwaway line in Krull's explanatory moments to give any indication where they came from - I guess it is another of the many, many plot elements that they "explain" with a single sentence, and you just shouldn't think about (that's my problem I guess, I thought about this movie instead of just gloried in the graphic glitter). It just seems to me that if you have billions and ships and therefore pilots, it behooves you to do a little more leg work on explaining where they all came from.

I did appreciate the homage to the Enterprise series that was done. Though I wondered how the Franklin could have a higher registry number (326) than the NX-01 when it was to have been an older ship is certainly nerdy, but I liked how they connected that series here.

So... high marks for the cast. High marks for the CGI crew. Low marks, in my opinion, for the producers.