Review of Star Trek: Nemesis (2002) by Jacob M — 14 Jan 2014

Star Trek: Nemesis is the final Trek film featuring The Next Generation cast. It's also viewed by many as the second worst Trek film, behind The Final Frontier, though many Trekkies today believe it's really underrated. It's also the only Trek film that was a notorious box-office bomb (mostly due to competition with other 2002 blockbusters), whose disappointing numbers caused the franchise to eventually die before JJ Abrams successfully rebooted it in 2009. Before watching Nemesis, I had read numbers of reviews showing how divided this film was... and after watching Nemesis, I feel it's definitely not as bad as The Final Frontier... but it's definitely one of the weaker Trek installments.

In the final mission we witness featuring The Next Generation cast, as Riker (Jonathan Frakes) and Troi (Marina Sirtis) have finished their wedding vows, the crew are called upon by Romulans to discuss peace with their leader, Shinzon (Tom Hardy). As Picard (Patrick Stewart) and Shinzon discuss, it becomes clear that Shinzon is actually a clone of Picard's younger years, and has intentions to kill of the Enterprise crew, and eventually, Earth. The Enterprise has to risk it all even more to defeat what could possibly be their greatest nemesis yet.

The film also features Brent Spiner as Data and a similar android named B4, LeVar Burton as LaForge, Michael Dorn as Worf, Gates McFadden as Dr. Crusher, and Ron Pearlman as the Romulan Viceroy.

For a while I was getting into Nemesis. There were interesting ideas, such as Data having a brother android and Riker getting married, but the film does tire out after a while. Like with Insurrection, which was terribly underrated and still struggled in developing Riker's romantic situation, the chemistry between Frakes and Sirtis is still weak. A love sequence between the two is quite freaky to watch due to how poorly developed the romance is. The two can act, but the romance isn't all that convincing. Brent Spiner does excellent at portraying both Data and B4, but the B4 arc dulls out and doesn't really play into the main plot. Other cast members are still fun to watch in their final film, especially Patrick Stewart, but the send off is not that strong. The CGI visuals are still very strong and impressive and Jerry Goldsmith's score, which was one of his last, is a really enjoyable listen, but besides that, there's not really that much to enjoy in Nemesis.

The thing that makes Nemesis fail the most is the villain is extremely dull. Tom Hardy is an excellent actor, especially when playing the evil strong psychopath Bane in The Dark Knight Rises, but here as the Romulan Picard clone Shinzon, he's extremely weak. The problem is that the producers try to make him as evil as Khan, and he fails terribly. The majority of Hardy's scene are extremely dull and Hardy has a miserable accent in this film. Even more embarrassing is Ron Pearlman as the Romulan Viceroy, who's equally as bad.

Besides Hardy's terrible performance, there were some good action sequences here and there, but when we get to the final act, things fall apart pretty quick. The finale, featuring Picard and Shinzon's battle strategies, as with Hardy's character, is trying to act like what made Wrath of Khan great, but fails miserably. Had it not been for the final moments of the climax including a main character's self-sacrifice, this film would definitely get a rotten score. Other than the end of it, this final act is dull, overlong, and way too drawn out.

While Nemesis tries to be an entertaining sci-fi flick with some action sequences, like with Insurrection, Tom Hardy's extremely weak villain performance and the dull final act makes the film the second worst Trek film ever made in my book, just behind the truly rotten Final Frontier. I did not hate Nemesis, but with the excellent material in Trek greats as Wrath of Khan, Voyage Home, Undiscovered Country, Insurrection, and First Contact, Nemesis is definitely a disappointing send off for The Next Generation crew. Thankfully JJ Abrams got the franchise back on track with an excellent reboot.