For reasons I can not explain, intermittent internet access at the casa tonight.
Star Trek = awesome
Angels and Demons = meh
Four Christmases- As far as the genre goes, good. I mean, it has the guys from Swingers, right.
Hopefully the intertrons will be fixed by tomorrow. I’ve set up qa CBS Sunday Morning thread to go auto if not.
We are affirmative on couch burns and off to bed.
Brick Oven Bill
So what were the breathalyzer results after Tiger roared out of his driveway at 2:25 am, plowed through a fire hydrant, and into the neighbor’s yard, meeting his tree?
Oh wait, never mind.
So the facial lacerations were actually from the deranged wife swinging a golf-club, and not a result of running through the fire hydrant en-route to the neighbor’s tree in the Cadillac SUV. Deranged wives are pre-existing conditions, and Tiger’s health issue should be fully covered.
This is because America is a strange place.
General Winfield Stuck
King Kong. Jack Black is a national treasure, of sorts.
Nite John Boy, nite Lily, nite Tunchmeister.
Shoe
set phasers to gratuitous!
patrick
Star Trek was cool enough, but I couldn’t get past Nero’s decision on what to do when he got sent back in time — seek revenge on Spock for the destruction of Romulus. With his foreknowledge of 154 years (2233 to 2387) years, wouldn’t it have made much more sense to save his home planet instead?
Yutsano
@Brick Oven Bill: I can see you trying for coherence but you’re just missing the mark by that much…
JGabriel
Brick Oven Bill:
(Boggles.)
.
Brick Oven Bill
We have previously compared Hilzoy (‘my mind is unchanged’) with the Climate Change Hoper Phil Jones (‘I can’t see either of these papers being in the next IPCC report. Kevin and I will keep them out somehow — even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is!’).
Let us now consider Pat Kennedy and Tiger:
First consider Tiger (wealth and the media agenda):
‘We’re also told Woods had said during the conversation Friday he had been taking prescription pain medication for an injury, which could explain why he seemed somewhat out of it at the scene.’
And now consider Pat (birth):
‘Rep. Patrick Kennedy said Friday he was entering treatment for addiction to prescription pain medication, a decision made after a highly publicized car crash near the Capitol that the congressman said he cannot recall.’
Personally, I think that the chances that both were just drunk to be pretty good. One man’s opinion. Pat did not get beat up by his wife though. I do not know if Pat is married.
Thomas
Just to offer a different take on Star Trek…I enjoy the movies and have seen a lot of the television episodes but wouldn’t describe myself as a trekkie by any stretch of the imagination.
I was thoroughly unimpressed by the new movie, which really surprised me.
It has one of them most bizarre scripts I’ve ever seen. One of the most interesting parts being that the writers actually had a character from the future tell a character from the past that he needed to have character development.
SPOILER
Leonard Nimoy Spock tells Kirk that he needs to be friends with Quinto Spock. If that isn’t some really sloppy writing I don’t know what is. So the later Spock-Kirk argument/fight scene doesn’t come from any natural, interesting place it comes from Leonard Nimoy acting as a totally random catalyst (and not serving any other purpose). Just blew my mind and made me rather bored for the second half of the film.
Also the coincidence of Kirk being marooned on the same planet as a future Spock AND a Scotty with the power to warp people onto moving ships is just a little too much to swallow. And I know people say “Oh yeah, but you believe phasers and warp speed, but can’t buy a simple coincidence har, har” but there have to be some things that can go to far in a science fiction film and this particular coincidence is one of them.
I would give the film a C. It was nice to look at and I enjoyed some of the performances when they weren’t having other characters tell them to develop relationships.
Also why did Bones disappear for the second half? Seemed like more sloppy writing.
Anyway, very much enjoy the bloggings…
Yutsano
@Brick Oven Bill: Mmm…word salad.
Wile E. Quixote
@patrick
Yeah, and with 154 years of superior technology wouldn’t he have been able to give the Romulan Empire a huge strategic advantage over the Federation, the Klingons, the Cardassians and the Teabagganians who are a lot like the Pakleds only less intelligent and not as likable.
My biggest problem was with the idea that you’re going to give a 23 year old kid command of the hottest starship in the Federation. I just couldn’t see that happening. Still I loved the movie and saw it four times in the theater, there was great chemistry between Zachary Quinto as Spock and Chris Pine as Kirk was great. Simon Pegg made a fantastic Scotty, Karl Urban had Bones down to a “T” and Zoe Saldana, OMFG! Oh, and Rachel Nichols, the actress who played Gaila, the smokin’ hot, green Orion chick? She has a double major in math and economics from Columbia. Brains and beauty too.
JK
@Wile E. Quixote:
Second that comment about the cast in Star Trek. They all did outstanding work.
Wile E. Quixote
Is it just me or has Mythbusters run out of interesting myths to bust? OK, the recent episode with the boat made of duct tape was kind of cool (although they missed testing the myth of 90 mile an hour tape), but how many people think about this stuff? It’s just not the same as say, trying to blow up a shark with a compressed air cylinder or seeing if a shark could tow a boat backwards.
Oh, and I’m watching NCIS: Los Angeles. Now, I know that we did just suffer through eight years of George W. Bush, and I know that Barack Obama has been pretty fucking lame on the civil liberties front, but still, what the fuck are a bunch of squids doing investigating a murder that occurred off base? I grew up in a Navy town and when the squids did something stoopid off base the local cops were in charge, not the squids and I’m pretty sure things are still that way. IANAL, but you know, posse comitatus and shit. I have to keep watching though because Pauley Perrette, the hot goth/geek chick from NCIS: Not in Los Angeles is going to be on this episode. Yeah, I’m fucking pathetic, you don’t need to tell me.
gwangung
That’s a good enough reason for me.
gwangung
Good enough reason for me.
Wannabe Speechwriter
All I can say is what is up with JJ Abrams obsession with love triangles? First Alias, then Lost, now this? Also, this little element:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6XmyduTW4s
Finally
VULCAN LIVES!!!
Hippie Killer
As a long time Star Trek (TOS mostly, but also TNG) fan, I actually think this was the best of the Star Trek Movies.
The Onion had a great video about the haters a while back — “Trekkies Bash New Fun, Watchable.”
gwangung
Um, am I on the bad boy’s list?
MattR
@Wile E. Quixote: Mythbusters lost quite a bit of credibility with me and my friends when they stated that soda cans will not explode in a car. Having tried to clean up the mess and then having to deal with a lecture from my father when the attempted cleaning failed to remove the evidence from his car, I can say for a fact that it is possible.
Parthenon
Star Trek was good. That’s not how black holes work, but meh, it’s Star Trek, who really cares.
JasonF
Star Trek was an atrocious movie that was enjoyable despite the seeming best efforts of Abrams to make a terrible movie.
My first problem with it was the nonsense about these green recruits being given command of the flagship. It was ridiculous and would never have been in the movie if they hadn’t insisted on a Muppet Babies-style approach to the franchise. I hated Muppet Babies — you weren’t fooling me, Henson! I know the gang didn’t meet until the events described in the original Muppet Movie, and Abrams isn’t fooling me with this whole “Let’s have everyone slot into their place in the command structure of the Enterprise straight out of the Academy!” nonsense. But in order to accomodate a Tiger Beat cast, we had to stack plot contrivance on top of plot contrivance to come up with a sequence of events that simply makes no sense in the context of the fictional universe they’ve established.
So that’s problem one. Problem two is the ridiculous plot. As others have pointed out, Nero’s actions did not make any sense whatsoever given his motivation. That’s the other big plot hole — counting the “Hey, let’s put the rookies in charge!” thing as the first — but there are about a thousand other little plot holes throughout the movie.
Problem three was that they made Spock an asshole. The real Spock would never have done to Kirk what Spock did in that movie. There’s nothing logical about being a dickhead, let alone trying to murder a colleague who is being insubordinate.
If, instead of featuring Kirk, Spock, and McCoy, it had featured newly created characters, the movie would have been an forgetable piece of crappy sci-fi. But because it featured characters we love — and, with the exception of Quinto’s Spock, they nailed all the characters — the movie was elevated to something enjoyable. But it was enjoyable on the pure adrenaline of seeing characters we love in a new context, not because the movie itself was any good.
gwangung
test
freelancer
@Wile E. Quixote:
Mythbusters has not jumped the shark. To me it remains one of the most seminal fun and educational shows out there. It’s not exactly science, but it is skepticism at work, and that is why I love it.
Ranger 3
Will enjoy seeing the Steelers get pwn3d, naturally. It can’t always be Super Bowl XL, the Steelers don’t get to play the Seahawks every week.
Ray Lewis is going to have some fun Sunday.
Brett
Assuming they can round up the actors, I still think they’ll probably re-boot the original series with the new cast and storyline at some point.
Aside from that, I mostly agree with your points. On top of that, doesn’t anybody on the Enterprise actually stay at their assigned posts? Chekov I can forgive, but Uhura leaving her post to wish Spock goodbye?
I still think it was pretty enjoyable, though – and I liked all the actors.
Yutsano
Whole wheat spaghetti al carbonara, more or less the traditional way. Yum.
mcd410x
Just beginning the “Bad Robot” production of Star Trek. Will have more tomorrow night!!!
(Alias was very good before they destroyed SD-6.)
jenniebee
Finished the Palin book, and have to say, everybody who gushes about how she’s a talented politician is full of crap. She’s a talented speaker, but her political instincts are terrible. She implies in the book, for example, that the real reason that she left the governorship was that she was driven out financially by the burden of defending herself against baseless ethics complaints. If she’d gone to the country with that as her reason, if she’d gotten up and made a speech about how these tactics are making it impossible for anyone who isn’t either independently wealthy or backed by wealthy interests to hold office, she’d have gained momentum from it. It would have been an outrageously powerful statement. Either she didn’t have the brains or instinct to figure that out, or her ego wouldn’t let her admit it, or both… whatever. But between not knowing how to let something just drop out of the news cycle, burning every bridge she walks across and not knowing a good line when it’s right there in front of her… she’s just destined to be one train wreck after another.
SiubhanDuinne
@jenniebee: Did you read it because you had to (for your job or something) or was this a voluntary exercise?
I just finished reading David Plouffe’s book about the 2008 campaign, *The Audacity to Win.* I found it a fascinating, clear-eyed account of the nearly two years from announcement to election night, and even though I pretty much knew how it was going to come out, it was surprisingly suspenseful. Highly recommended.
gwangung
Intermittent access? Well, my posting privileges seem to be gone.
charles johnson
Jason F’s criticisms I agree with, though I’d add one more. If JJ Abrams didn’t have a cat turd where most humans have a brain, he would have realized ages ago that you don’t take an artifact like lens flare and deliberately amp it up to the point that you can hardly see what’s happening in the scene. There’s an ep or two of Fringe where it’s really bad, really distracting (I think season 1 ep 2) and then in the next ep it’s virtually eliminated, presumably because a studio exec with three brain cells to rub together walked over to the post-production dept and kicked him square in the balls.
JK
@JasonF: @charles johnson:
One annoying thing about the interviews that J.J. Abrams did around the time Star Trek opened was he bragged about the fact that he wasn’t a fan of the original series. I thought this was a cheap shot at the show and revealed a lack of class on his part.
JR
John… you once mentioned a music site you tried and found to be awesome where if I recall you would play a song and it would play additional songs it thought you would like from there. Does that ring a bell and if so can you give us the site again?
JackieBinAZ
This transplanted New Englander is happy to report that McIntosh apples have finally arrived in my part of the Southwest! They usually show up in the fall and are only around for a scant couple of months. Who knew a fruit as lowly as the apple could be so appreciated? But after all the inferior varieties I’ve had to endure as a poor and struggling student this semester (Red “Delicious” – ugh!), this is something to celebrate.
JackieBinAZ
@JR: Pandora.com
JackieBinAZ
Here’s the link…lazy me!
Wil
Insultingly stupid movie. It’s hard to believe it was so well-received….it’s like all critical faculties of critics and moviegoers alike just vanished. I have no idea why.
Soooo…..the “independent timeline” or alternate universe idea or whatever that JJ Abrams is so proud of and everyone seems to think is so brilliant is such a lame plot device that it should have been treated with the same amount of respect as the “It was all just a dream!” device is given. How sloppy. How lame.
Soooo….where did this ice planet hovering around Vulcan so close that it appears as close as Earth’s moon come from? All this time in space, this planet was there and nobody ever noticed? Really?
Soooo….the guy who doesn’t look like Kirk, sound like Kirk, or act like Kirk is being chased on the Hoth ice planet by the humongous red monster….he runs into a cave, where we find out (fortunately for non-Kirk) that the monster is actually very frightened of old Vulcans waving a couple of flaming branches around. Good to know its Achilles Heel.
Soooo….a cadet cheating on a test is such a big deal that his punishment involves some sort of trial that actually packs the house and has all the big brass involved as well? Yeah, that’s believable.
Soooo….luckily that big-lipped kid who looks even less like Kirk than Chris Pine…managed to barely avoid driving into the massive gorge…..oh wait…Iowa doesn’t have any massive gorges, does it?
Soooo….Kirk is now supposedly born right at the moment his father is sacrificing himself and his ship, and his mother is in contact with him, talking about the birth? Hell, I half expected her to cry out, “Luke!!!!” instead. Anybody who considers themselves to have an ounce of ability to recognize a good movie should have mentally bailed right there at the beginning.
Soooo…why is a pregnant woman about to give birth on board a starship anyway? This isn’t Next Gen, this is twenty years before the original series…pregnant woman were not on starships.
Soooo…..when Vulcan is being drilled into by the giant drill, sure is lucky Enterprise happens to be there to send down three guys, one armed with a sword, because apparently Vulcan has no defenses at all, not even fighter planes.
Soooo….at the end, when Earth is being drilled by the giant drill, sure is lucky that Quinto Spock is there with his shuttlecraft to blow the thing up, because I guess all of Earth has no defenses EITHER, not even a biplane. The thing is apparently easy to destroy if Quinto Spock can do it with such a tiny, single ship….but I guess all of Earth’s ships, every single one, were in the shop that particular day.
Soooo…..”red matter”? Granted, ST and every other sci-fi show has technobabble galore and invented stuff that is just made up, but “red matter”? That’s the best they could do? Who came up with that, a second-grader? Might as well have been underpants gnomes.
Soooo….kinda funny that that Eric Bana, Ruiner of Movies, maroons Old Spock on the not-there-before Ice Planet Hoth, which happens to orbit right next to Vulcan….so Old Spock can watch Vulcan be destroyed. Seems like if it were me and I wanted to force Old Spock to witness this event, a much better seat would be on the bridge of my ship, where he can witness every detail, instead of a planet where he just sees Vulcan as a disk in the sky. Of course if Eric Bana, Ruiner of Movies, had done that, then who would have scared off the giant red dragon monster with a couple of torches?
The movie has so many plot holes and crap that doesn’t make any sense at all. JJ Abrams is a Star Wars guy who doesn’t even care for Star Trek much, and that should have disqualified him from directing the film right from the get-go, except he’s a big name director and his movies make money, and the powers that be just wanted to cash in, Armageddon-style. In fact, a Star Trek with Bruce Willis as Captain Kirk would have been more believable than this garbage.
It is ridiculously unfaithful to anything that is Star Trek, and with the exception of Quinto, who really did nail Spock, the casting was terrible. The guy who played Chekov looked nothing at all like Chekov. Chris Pine looked, sounded, and acted nothing like Kirk.
The movie sucked, from beginning to end.
Balconesfault
Late in Angels and Demons I got crisis fatigue. This happens to me in movies like this one, or the post-shipwreck scenes in Titanic, where characters keep rushing from life threatening situation to life threatening situation with no pacing or break in between and the success in each situation depends on some improbable twist that drives the overall probability towards a limit of 0.
That and the fact that neither the Swiss Guard nor the Rome Police seem to ever have heard of triangulation.
Speaking of probability … when anyone else reads BOB, are they wondering how many monkeys?
Napoleon
I don’t know if anyone has seen the new Rolling Stone but Tiabbi goes after Obama (and so does the RS does in an editorial) for his handling of the financial crisis, and financial regulation. Actually calls Obama a bait and switch act.
JK
@Napoleon:
Good for Matt Taibbi for holding Obama’s feet to the fire.
kommrade reproductive vigor
@JR: Pandora.com. Be prepared to spend a few hours unable to tear yourself away from your computer.
Star Trek: Movies with any element of time travel are created simply to confuse the viewer so much he never gets to the point where he says “Fuck it,” and walks out.
The dude who played Bones was so good it was sorta creepy, though.
Spoiler. Spoiler. Spoiler.
Also, if I were any more of a multi-culti dude, I’d be plaid, but Uhura & Spock WTF. Can we say CONTRIVED, boys and girls?
Not enough explosions. Also.
Lisa K.
Angels & Demons was terrible.
JGabriel
Wannabe Speechwriter:
Actually, between Alias and Star Trek, I’m more worried about Abrams fixation with Red Balls. Did someone threaten his nuts at impressionable age?
.
JGabriel
Lisa K.:
Nah, Angels & Demons was just mediocre. Now The Love Guru , that was terrible.
.
Keith G
@Napoleon: @JK: Thank you for that morning dose of concern.
geg6
LOL! I’m laughing my ass off at all the Star Trek and JJ Abrams bashers here. Too damn funny. Doods, It’s a fucking movie based on a series that often made no goddam sense. Believe me, I’m a Trekker from episode one of TOS and have faithfully watched every ep of every Trek series. Abrams reboot was as fun as could be and the cast was wonderful. Were there implausibilities? Duh. It’s Star Trek (not to mention sci-fi, a genre which has only one franchise that I could ever stand, namely this one). It’s a feature not a bug. And it’s fiction, not a documentary. It’s. Great ride and all my Trekker friends that went with me agreed.
arguingwithsignposts
In the market for a new used car. Thinking volkswagen 2002-05. Anyone have any experience with the german cars?
geg6
Umm, that’s supposed to be “It’s a great ride.”. Damn edit.
JK
@JGabriel:
Luckily, I haven’t seen any of these movies, but based on the reviews I’ve read of them, all would qualify as terrible
Top 10 movie flops of the decade
http://movies.yahoo.com/news/movies.reuters.com/top-10-movie-flops-decade-reuters
1. THE ADVENTURES OF PLUTO NASH
2. BATTLEFIELD EARTH
3. LAND OF THE LOST
4. GIGLI
5. TOWN & COUNTRY
6. CATWOMAN
7. THE INVASION
8. ROLLERBALL
9. GRINDHOUSE
10. THE SPIRIT
These 3 movies are supposed to suck big time:
Leonard Part 6, Ishtar, Wild, Wild West
JK
@arguingwithsignposts:
arguing,
What happened with your blog? Do you plan to revive it at some point in the future?
arguingwithsignposts
@JK:
Yeah. It’s been on hiatus recently. I’ve been blogging at a regular gig which sucks up a lot of energy, plus real life, plus commenting here. :)
thanks for asking.
arguingwithsignposts
@kommrade reproductive vigor:
Yeah, Pandora is teh awesome. We turned it on over Thanksgiving and just let it play in the background while enjoying Thanksgiving dinner preparations, etc. Never hit a sour note.
JK
@arguingwithsignposts:
Is this something you can share in public here on Balloon Juice, so that interested people can check out your work at that other place?
arguingwithsignposts
@JK:
Unfortunately, I can’t share it publicly. But if you e-mail me at aws -at- arguewithsigns.net, I’ll send you a link.
Jack
I have to agree about those three movie summations. Star Trek was big screen awesome. Yes, “red matter” is a deux ex machina, and gimmicky as hell. But, the movie still rocked.
Angels and Demons could have been a good movie, but “meh.”
And 4C wasn’t half bad. It was 40% bad, which made it worth the $1 @ the redbox.
Nothing beats The Hangover, this year, though. Nothing. Not one damned movie. Not one.
Jack
deus*
arguingwithsignposts
@Jack:
Gotta admit the hangover was a great movie. Zach Galifinakis (sp?) is funny as hell too. Highly recommend the Patton Oswalt comedy tour movie on Netflix with Zach G. in it.
JK
@arguingwithsignposts:
I just sent you an email message with a list of books on lobbying for the project you described in a previous thread.
Look forward to getting your link because I’m always interested in finding another cool blog or website.
arguingwithsignposts
@JK:
Well, it’s a little specialized, so hope it’s worth the trip. Just responded to your e-mail.
jeffreyw
Ah, good morning all. Mrs J has just rolled outta bed and the pups are all dancing the “I gotta pee now” finale from the opera of the same name.
jeffreyw
Another thing as I sip this awful Folger’s coffee–isn’t it about time for another coffee thread?
arguingwithsignposts
Speaking of my blog, I’m still particularly pleased with this graphical representation of the GOP: I Think this explains it all.
jeffreyw
@arguingwithsignposts: LOLZ
Nicole
For those who haven’t seen this- the-editing-room’s summary of the Star Trek screenplay is so full of win.
I liked the movie a lot, though, when the alternate time line thing was explained, I found myself very concerned about where the crew in this time line was going to find whales.
jeffreyw
@arguingwithsignposts: Think you can put a pic of Glenn Beck in that center spot? hee hee
geg6
Just watched the local Sunday public interest show the Pgh. Post Gazette and KDKA-TV do and they intereview two local authors. And now I am forced to go and buy two new books. First is a book about Pittsburgh architecture, which I adore. The second is by my favorite local columnist, Brian O’Neil. He’s a native of Long Island who has been here 20 years and really “gets” the city and its people. It’s called “The Paris of Appalachia,” and no, that’s not a joke. Gotta have it. Oh, and Tom Petty on CBS SM, bithchez!
2th&nayle
Razorbacks lost a heart breaker in overtime to LSU last night. Dammit. I was so depressed I got up at 5:00am and made a batch of banana/pineapple/nut bread. Came out great. Ate three slices as soon as it cooled enough. I feel better now. Still got 2-1/2 loafs left. Ya’ll come on by. I’ll make a fresh pot of coffee.
geg6
Ugh. Bitchez. Damn.
JK
@arguingwithsignposts:
Specialized is fine as long as it’s interesting and has information I haven’t seen elsewhere.
Your graphical representation of the Republican Party is still right on the money. I hope you revive your blog at some point down the road.
arguingwithsignposts
@JK:
Well, you inspired me to rant a little about Ben Bernanke: Hey, Ben, here’s a big cup of STFU.
:)
kommrade reproductive vigor
WARNING: INTENSE GEEKOSITY AHEAD
That’s one of the problems with sci-fi (and fantasy). Creators are more likely to get lazy and say: Oh well it’s sci-fi, we’ll just throw in some more explosions or aliens or time warps or whatever to cover up the holes (substitute magic and unicorns if you’re talking fantasy). Nuh-uh. You’re telling a story. If your story isn’t internally consistent, ur doing it rong. I thought the original ST episodes were at least internally consistent. They didn’t really have the budget for anything else.
(I know this happens in more “traditional” genres, but I’m a geek. I love sci-fi and get my drawers in a bunch when people treat it like the red-headed step child of literature.)
/End I.G.
kommrade reproductive vigor
(And by “people” I mean writers and movie makers. Not readers and viewers. I kan haz edit funktyun?)
RedKitten
@freelancer:
It’s my 12-year-old nephew’s favourite show, which really gives me a lot of hope for the next generation.
Happy Sunday, everybody. It’s a good morning — I’m sipping coffee, reading BJ, Sam’s napping in his swing (as I listen to its little electronic version of Für Elise), and later today, we’re going out to the Christmas tree farm to get our tree. The 4-foot tall artificial tree is already up in the dining room and decorated — this trip is for the 7-foot tall live beastie that’ll be going in the living room.
Bush/Cheney War Crimes
Add aiding and abetting a known terrorist to the list. Well, to be fair – catching Osama Bin Laden wasn’t going to put any dollars in Halliburton’s pocket now was it? Besides, it was always all about the oil. If they HAD caught Bin Laden in 2001 how would we have gotten troops into Afghanistan? It would have been harder for them to lie their way into invading Iraq no?
http://www.mahablog.com/2009/11/29/report-bush-let-bin-laden-get-away/
donovong
@arguingwithsignposts: Warning. Repair costs for used European cars can be horrendous. The snooty factor raises labor and parts costs to the stratosphere. IMHO, while they have had some embarassing recall issues lately, Toyota is still Numero Uno in the quality and longevity arena. Repair costs are no where near those of VW, BMW, etc.
arguingwithsignposts
@donovong:
thanks, donovong. I’ve had toyotas most of my life. great cars. they’re a little pricey for me right now, though. I’m also looking at Subarus, but those owners love them some Subarus.
Toast
I thought the new Trek was a ton of fun, and I count myself a huge fan of the franchise (with the exception of “Enterprise”, which never actually happened so just move on). Yes, the way the crew so quickly found themselves maneuvered into their pre-ordained spots was contrived. So what? The acting was top-notch – especially by Chris Pine – and the technical effects, sets, etc. were glorious. The plot was a bit tired — really, following on Insurrection you have to ask: Are there any Romulans who aren’t deranged psychopaths? — and I thought it odd that everyone seemed to take 6,000,000,000 Vulcans dying pretty much in stride, but in the end nothing could derail the sheer joy of this movie. Abrams brought life back to a universe which had been devoid of it for some time.
@Wile E. Quixote: Hilarious Pakled/Teabagger comparisons. I can just see their dull eyes now as they mumble “We look for things. Things to make us angry.”
JK
@arguingwithsignposts:
According to the latest survey from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, Suburus have a great safety record.
http://www.iihs.org/news/rss/pr111809.html
lee
I’m also a trekkie. Too young for the original broadcast, but grew up watching it.
I loved the new movie. The entire idea was to make similar but not identical characters, ideas, etc.
You see this from the very opening scene where Kirk’s dad was in Star Fleet (which I’m pretty sure was not true in the original).
We just completed our home theater and this was the first movie I watched.
James Gary
GREG GRUNBERG
YOUNG CHRIS PINE, why do you have to be so REBELLIOUS?
NOKIA PRODUCT PLACEMENT
I’m obnoxious!
YOUNG CHRIS PINE
Because I’m a REBEL, man. Speaking of fucking the system, I’m going to drive your car into a canyon.
GREG GUNBERG
A canyon in the middle of Iowa? Has J.J. ABRAMS ever actually been there?
DIRECTOR J.J. ABRAMS
Iowa’s near Arizona, right?
Link here.
Shell
Star Trek’s next on my Netflix list. Just got done with “UP” That was absolutely wonderful.
tamiedjr
We had an early T-giving dinner and watched Star Trek together that night. My sister and nephew had rented it from the red box. I ran out yesterday and bought my own copy. I loved it!
We also watched the Chorus Line documentary, which for any Broadway musical fan, is absolutely fascinating. I saw the OBC when I was a kid: first trip to NYC, first Broadway show. I was telling my brother, who took me there, that I remember every detail of that evening as if it was yesterday, even though I can’t remember every detail FROM yesterday.
Long weekends are the best!
Alien-Radio
Star Trek bugged me massively. Too many anachronisms, It wasn’t Cool when Tom Paris did it in voyager, It’s not cool In a big budget Movie.
Given how the franchise was driven into the ground over the course of Voyager (maybe 8 good episodes out of 172) and Enterprise (No good episodes, only worth watching for Jeffery Coombs) with a steady diet of recycled plots from old TNG episodes; Holodecks Gone Mad, Cosmic reset button Time travel episodes, Pouty Birds with Tits in a catsuit, Walking plot contrivances, Soap opera bullshit, Isotons, Contrived technobabble get out of jail free cards, and none of this applied to an actual Star Trek story (the Aliens are us!) To actually justify any of it; This new film Commits many of the same sins as the TV shows that pretty much killed the television franchise.
It’s fucking idiotic If they wanted a reboot just fucking reboot it, The casting was good enough that pretty much all the roles got nailed, I didn’t need you to shoe horn Leonard Nimoy into this film, ESPECIALLY not with some retarded Time travel plot that remided me of some of the worst espisodes of star trek that helped kill the franchise in the first place.
Having plot holes Every where is bad enough, To Hang the whole film on a Magguffin that still has it’s place holder name obviously unchanged since the back of an evelope stage of development (uhhh it’s some stuff,uhhh matter uhhhm my pen is red? RED MATTER!) Only draws attention to the whole clusterfuck.
So time travel and comsic reset button plus some isotons of pure Macguffinite? that’s Well Into lazy Voyager writing Territory.
The whole plot had massive violence done to it in order to shoe horn characters into position.
I liked the characterisation, but the actual film is a bit crap.
gwangung
Heh. Compare the complaints to Tim Lynch’s view (if anyone is old enough to remember him).
AngusTheGodOfMeat
@Wil:
Heh. I saw the movie in the theater when it came out, and my impressions were pretty similar to yours.
An exercise in special effects and some cool anecdotes, but otherwise just a plot to steal money out of my wallet. And about twenty five times too much old Spock. Give me a fucking break.
Oh well, the popcorn was good.
Hob
@Wile E. Quixote:
IIRC, Nero did have something like that in mind. He ranted a little about how the Romulans had been held back by their treaties with the Federation, & basically blamed all their problems on this including the big one (because, I guess, they should’ve had more planets to spare… or, they would’ve been able to deal with disasters if they hadn’t had to rely on flaky Feds like Spock). So he was out to hurt the Federation badly & set them back; revenge on Spock was a bonus. Like I said in the other thread, this was the only part of the plot that did make sense.
celticdragon
@geg6:
Word.
Wannabe Speechwriter
@geg6:
True, it’s just a movie. It’s not like this will determine whether we will be able to eat tonight or pay next month’s rent. It might also more socially valuable to debate the finer points of the health care bill. However, it seems to be the consensus most people here thought the plot holes in the movie we just too much and that JJ Abrams is very sloppy when it comes to telling a story. Now, Mr. Abrams is asking us to give up time and, in the case of movies and DVDs, money to see products. If we don’t think it’s worth it to spend cash or waste time on his stuff, shouldn’t we tell other people this?
Matt T.
Star Trek lost me right at the beginning when the huge, overdone musical score drowned out the exploding space ship. Abrams, the hack he is, must’ve felt that we wouldn’t have gotten how big a deal Kirk’s dad dying was without massive orchestral accompianiment. Also, the guy playing Bones must’ve been told to watch Brad Douriff on “Deadwood” and copy that badly. And are there no people in the future who aren’t incredible hawt? Guess that’s why mini-skirts are standard cadet issue.
I went to see it with a friend who’d never seen anything from the original franchise, not any of the original movies or TV series, and as we walked out the theatre she said, “I know you like Star Trek, so I hope you won’t be offended when I say that was crap.” I wasn’t ’cause she’s right.
But, it’s just a movie and de gustibus something or other. I didn’t mind the whole time travel-equals-new reality thing, Simon Pegg was good, of course, and the kid playing Chekov was amusing. Everyone else acted at one another rather than with, but that’s par for the course when it comes to Hollywood, it seems.
“Eric Bana, Ruiner of Movies”. Heh. I’ll have to remember that.
Brachiator
@JasonF:
I agree. I thought the cast was great and enjoyed the movie, but kept wishing that it had been better. Not just better Trek, but a better movie.
Yeah. I know the fan boys and girls demand this (and it is also one of the things that dooms crap like the tv show Smallville to eternal failure), but having all the original Trek crew meet as younguns and assume their familiar roles on the Enterprise is not only nonsense, it’s lazy and boring. One of the more interesting things about the original series was that the characters had careers experiences before the start of the adventures of the Enterprise, and that there was some distance between the junior and senior officers. I did, by the way, like the way that Kirk and McCoy met.
I didn’t have a problem with a lack of a Shatner cameo, especially since it would have taken focus away from the adventures of the young Kirk.
By the way, the idea of a villain from the future going into the past to attack our heroes — wasn’t this done already in First Contact? I thought that Bana’s character was a waste of time.
I didn’t have a problem with the idea of rebooting the franchise, but thought that Abrams’ approach was a lot less original than people want to admit.
Lastly, I thought that a lot of the action pieces were poorly designed and executed, in part because Abrams is not a good movie director. He thinks like a TV guy.
But hey, the movie made bucks, the cast is hot, and they may do much better next time.
Wil
Ehhh….the very fact that you call yourself a “Trekker” kinda disqualifies your opinion, in my mind. Discovered the series around 2002, did you? “Faithfully watched every episode”? That should go without saying, at least for the original series.
Anyway….this Star Trek was not a science fiction movie. This was an action movie set in space, with very little of anything resembling ST or sci-fi in general.
As far as Chris Pine goes, here’s a quote from his Wikipedia entry about how he responded to the role of Kirk:
Basically, unlike Quinto’s dead-on portrayal of Spock, Chris Pine decides he doesn’t want to be as good a James T. Kirk as he can be, he would rather be some combination of Tom Cruise from Top Gun and Harrison Ford as Indy and Han Solo.
In other words, Pine didn’t much care for the character role he was given the job to reprise, so decided to change it into an entirely different character.
And this loser is the guy they chose to play Captain Kirk. Unforgivable. If he didn’t want to buckle down and try to be the best Kirk his acting ability allowed, he should have dropped the role and another actor should have been cast that would have faithfully recreated the character to the best of his ability.
That’s too bad that you don’t feel like copying William Shatner…..that’s your FUCKING JOB, and Shatner created the character.
I get the feeling that a lot of folks who didn’t grow up on Star Trek and real classic science fiction have only the CGI sci-fi in their knowledge base, and don’t really know what science fiction is, what Star Trek is, and probably think movies like Armageddon are great science fiction, because they don’t really have the background to know the difference between good sci-fi, bad sci-fi, and non-sci-fi.
Taylor
Fortunately, Zachary Quinto didn’t decide that he liked certain aspects of Nimoy’s Spock, but didn’t want to “imitate” Leonard Nimoy, so he decided to incorporate other characters from other movies into his portrayal of Spock.
Can you imagine: “Spock is so serious, so I decided to make him a little more fun, bring some Robin Williams and Tom Green into the character, and that’s why Spock can be seen smiling and cracking jokes a few times in the movie…”
Recreating beloved characters that everybody knows very well is ALL ABOUT getting the character right down to the last detail, and Chris Pine was obviously too lazy to do that, or not a good enough actor, so he took shortcuts and decided to just bring in elements from other characters he liked, even if they weren’t anything like the character he was hired on to play.
He’s a poor actor, who got the job through contacts with JJ Abrams’ wife.
Brachiator
@Wil:
So, let’s see. It’s not Star Trek. But it’s Star Trek.
My problem with the film has nothing to do with purity, but with the fact that it is indifferently plotted, and the idea of the entire cast having to be used from the jump was unnecessary and dramatically lame. I still enjoyed much of the movie, but was just disappointed that it was so cautious and unoriginal.
Are you bashing the film or defending it? I didn’t have a big problem with Pine or the characterization. There is no reason that a young Kirk has to be a mini-me replica of his later adult self.
Star Trek is hardly the beginning of science fiction.
Darkrose
@Wil:
I disagree. If Pine had simply copied Shatner, it would have come across as parody, because Shatner’s…syntax is…so…distinctive…not to mention that original series!Kirk doesn’t age well. The whole rampagingly sexist manwhore who takes himself incredibly seriously just doesn’t work as well in 2009 as it did in the ’60’s.
*shrugs* It worked for me, and not just because I can now write Trek slash with glee. I watched all of TNG, a good chunk of DS9, and the first season of Voyager. The plot had holes big enough to drive a Borg cube through–which made it like every other Trek film and most of the five series. And while I’m not the world’s biggest JJ Abrams fan, I do think he had a difficult job. Like the character of Kirk, Rodenberry’s “Wagon Train to the Stars” idea doesn’t mesh with a 21st century sensibility, or for that matter, Star Trek for an audience who’s seen the later TNG episodes, and DS9, which are all about moral and ethical compromises. Abrams could either slavishly recreate the original, which would have been laughable, or try for a new direction. The result isn’t perfect, but it’s enough to get at least a few people who’d given up on the franchise take another look at it.
Wil
Don’t get hung up on the name. I could photoshop ST uniforms on a Star Wars movie and give it the title ‘Star Trek’, but that wouldn’t make it a Star Trek movie. No need to get snotty here. If I use the title of the movie, and then go on to say “it’s not a Star Trek movie,” I’m thinking you ought to be able to grasp my meaning.
Certainly not defending that pile of crap. No, a Muppet-baby Kirk doesn’t have to be an EXACT replica, but he ought to at least look and act like someone who will one day be Captain Kirk. My whole point is that Chris Pine deliberately didn’t even try to incorporate various aspects of Shatner’s Kirk, and instead decided on his own to bring elements of Tom Cruise, Indiana Jones, and Han Solo into the character.
Which is lame as hell, and indicates a kid actor who isn’t mature enough to know what he is doing, who didn’t even watch the entire series before deciding not to bother with a full characterization of Kirk, and who basically did a “just enough to pass with the yokels” version of the character.
You say that there is no reason for Pine to do a ‘mini-me’ version of Kirk, but look at the fine job Zachary Quinto did with Spock….it damn near IS a mini-me of Spock, and was a fine job of recreating a complex character that is well-known and well-loved. Quinto really created a character that is plausibly a younger Spock.
Chris Pine created, well…..some dude who looks, sounds, and acts nothing like the character he is supposedly portraying. The fact that you don’t have a problem with a completely different character that doesn’t even resemble the original Kirk in any way just says that your opinion/taste is sort of ‘anything goes, do whatever the hell you want’. Mine isn’t.
Obviously. Don’t insult my intelligence, non-Kirk. Half-a-point if you get that easy reference.
Nobody thinks Star Trek was the beginning of science fiction, so let’s not play those little games. If you think any fan of science fiction thinks ST began the genre, then you don’t know the genre or the people who like it.
Wil
Well, getting Kirk’s syntax right is the difference between an actor who can do the job, and one who can’t.
You might say that there is only one Charlie Chaplin and nobody can move like he did, but go watch Robert Downey Jr.’s performance in that biopic and you’ll see a real actor at work.
Whether it’s a fictional character or a real person, it’s the job of the actor who reprises (recreates) that persona to do it faithfully to the best of their acting ability. If it’s a flop, a parody, whatever, then that’s the breaks but at least the actor did his best.
Deliberately leaving out parts of the character, while intentionally trying to bring in parts of other characters (Tom Cruise, Indy, Han Solo) is just a pathetic excuse of a bad actor, and bad casting in general. Chris Pine got the part because he knew Abrams’ wife, for crissake! Not through his own merits.
Don’t kid yourself, sister. I can guarantee you that any man you meet checks out your tits first and your face second. We are a little more subtle about it than back in the sixties, we are more careful about what we say, but in a lot of ways, nothing much has changed.
But that’s beside the point…..check out the movies, from the Motion Picture, through II, III, IV, V, and VI, and you’ll find that the sexism has been toned down, the women finally get to wear pants, and the “sexist manwhore” is not very apparent.
So it can be done, and indeed even has been done, and with the original Kirk.
That part of your argument doesn’t hold any water at all. I’m talking about the poor acting job of Chris Pine as Kirk, not larger social issues or anything involving the entire series.