STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS Review

If you haven’t watched it yet, only read this paragraph. For the diehard fan, you will be sorely disappointed. Remember Indiana Jones? All the wonderful goodness and then came the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull? This was way more disappointing.

Note: This is not a synopsis, but there are spoilers below.

Like any dedicated fan, we arrived 3 hours early – only 20 people in front of us. Within an hour there were well over 100 people in line, many in costume or sporting a Star Trek T-shirt. The crowd was a bit apprehensive but you could tell everyone was excited to see the wonder J.J. Abrams would bring to the screen with our favorite and most beloved Star Trek.  As the last Iron Man 3 show let out of the IMAX, we eagerly moved forward to get our 3D glasses and find the perfect seat.

With almost two hours to wait before the show started, you could hear old films being played on every device. The buildup to it was wonderful. The IMAX presentation we saw had a mini “light show” on the curtain set to the DS9 theme song. Just listening to Star Trek music in an IMAX is an unforgettable experience. Previews for Man of Steel and other features followed before the beautiful beginning of the show. Of course most of us had seen the 9 minute prequel in the dome when we saw The Hobbit so nothing new, but still exciting. Catchy lines, new aliens, arrows flying at you in 3D and fun ideas like hiding a ship under water made it fun and felt like the crazy Star Trek we all love.

(SPOILER ALERT) Then it happened – only 30 minutes in. The coolness vanished and you felt the impending doom of Indiana Jones 4 or the first G.I. Joe creep in. I can’t even say it was action packed. They took the best Star Trek film, The Wrath of Khan, and destroyed it. Had these been 2nd graders putting on a school play of Wrath of Khan with a modern twist I might have been able to endure it. But they weren’t.

Benedict Cumberbatch is a great actor and I commend him – it’s not his fault. He’s just not Ricardo Montalban. They should have picked someone like Antonio Banderas or at least someone not so un-Khan. I get that they want a broader audience and Benedict was probably chosen to help the film abroad. The only problem is he does not make a good Khan. Still I kept hoping, praying they were going to have Gary Mitchell as the bad guy. Alice Eve (Carol Marcus) even looks like Elizabeth Dehner from TOS S1E3. Benedict was MADE to be Gary Mitchell or maybe that’s just me, trying to find good in the new film.

Sitting in the theater I’m realizing I know the entire story and am so bored I’m considering leaving the theater. The poster we got at the end of the film was one of the few things keeping me in my seat. Spock and Kirk have switched positions because it’s an alternate reality. So Kirk will die but come back to life and Spock gets to yell KHAANNNN! (No joke, he really did and it was pathetic) They made all of the key points so obvious that they even had a dead tribble that gets Khan’s platelets (why would you ever revive a tribble?). Anyone still wondering how Kirk will come back to life? Oh and he’s not even close to dead yet but they assume the audience is so dense that they have to spell everything out before you get there.

Kirk loses the Enterprise, Khan blows things up, Pike dies, Kirk gets the ship back. That’s the most action and story plot you’ll see. You can leave the theater now. Khan transported himself to Qo’noS so now they have to sneak past the Klingons. You’d think this would be good. Nope. First I don’t think J.J. Abrams even knows what a Klingon looks like.

It’s like these are the costume ideas they threw out for Bane from The Dark Knight Rises and they figured, hey free costumes! There was no sense of fear or intimidation and worst of all no honor. They did a great job with the Romulans last show, so what happened?

Physics was thrown out the door at one point. They lose all power so Kirk and Scotty have to get to engineering. However, without gravity in space apparently it doesn’t make you float so Star Trek VI was wrong. No, you actually can run on the walls; then if the camera angle looks better, you can run on the ceiling until you get to stairs. There the gravity works in the correct direction.

I think the actors did a great job but without a good script and good directing you have a failure on your hands.

Since it was the first showing in IMAX 3D I did get the official movie poster that glows in the dark. High quality and the only identifying mark that tells you it’s from Into Darkness is the date in the corner.

So why did I find this so poorly done? Perhaps Bill Shatner has the answer: [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ha1Mjzj30P8#t=10m33s]

To all you Star Wars fans – best of luck. It seems our beloved universes are dying for the masses.