Another attempt to make Star Trek "cool"

Rating: 1/10 (8 October 2010)

After the awful Enterprise, this is another attempt at making Star Trek cool and appealing to a new audience. After watching this however, I would happily sit through the whole of Enterprise's four seasons. This is another attempt at rehashing a cheesy old series or film and making it "cool" for a new generation. This happened with Star Wars, The A-Team, Batman etc. I'm waiting for the Quantum Leap one next. Apparently, the overpaid executives in Hollywood are quickly running out of ideas for new material.
I had high hopes for this film and I watched Star Trek: Nemesis (the last Next Generation film) beforehand to get me in the mood for it. What I watched disgusted me mainly because it wipes out everything that happened in The Original Series, The Next Generation, Voyager, Deep Space Nine and all of the films (I don't really care about Enterprise, whether they wiped out what happened in it or not). People seem to hate Star Trek Nemesis, but as a fan of The Next Generation, it really is a million times better than this rubbish.
The actors who portrayed the characters were chosen either because they looked like the originals or because they sounded like them. The man who played Kirk played him like a Jason Bourne character who was some sort of genius who is wasting his talents. New Kirk is such a hero that he can get beaten up by a super strength half-Vulcan and not walk away with a scratch let alone a black eye. They make New Kirk copy Tom Cruise from A Few Good Men by having the "bad boy" officer eat an apple while he's on duty. I didn't like it with Tom Cruise, why is it here? Somehow they resurrected the character of Christopher Pike who is now some sort of ace Captain who hangs around bars looking for losers to recruit into Starfleet. The man who played Chekov was just some man putting on a horrid Russian accent. He was chosen just because of the accent. He looks nothing like the original. They hired some random Asian to be Sulu (they all look alike apparently) and Sulu is now a ninja. Uhura was again just some random black woman except she wasn't a 60s type black woman but a 21st century "gangsta" type black woman complete with attitude and accent. She's also a genius except this time in languages. As soon as I saw Scotty I thought "oh no not Simon Pegg." He was good in Hot Fuzz, Shaun of the Dead etc but really, he shouldn't be doing this; his Scottish accent was horrible and again, he looked nothing like the original. I have to give credit to the one who played McCoy as he almost had the same mannerisms as the original but they mucked up the character. This time he's a divorcée! He must have married young! His nickname of "Bones" is no longer a reference to his medical profession but because his "divorce" left him with nothing but his "bones." Is it me or is that the worst way a nickname has ever been acquired? Imagine if he'd said his divorce left him nothing but his clothes, would "clothes" be the new Kirk's nickname for him? Complete drivel. Lastly, Spock now has a history of being bullied because he's half human. Apparently even logical, emotionless Vulcans are capable of "racism." Oh yeah I forgot, the new gangsta Uhura and he are in love and keep kissing or something. I don't know I wasn't paying attention to it. This is supposed to be Star Trek. Still interested in watching this pap?
Onto the plot. Yes, it's time travel AGAIN. In the Star Treks the time travel episodes are the worst because they're a lame plot device to make anything happen and anything possible. Apparently a Romulan mining ship blames Spock for not saving his planet from an exploding star because Spock was too late. So he's gone back in time and exploded Vulcan as revenge. Why didn't he go back in time and save Romulus? No that's too simple. To do this he's acquired stuff called "Red Matter." What next for the sequel? Green Matter? Perhaps we can have a whole load of films with matters all the colours of the rainbow. I was cheering for the good guys to lose and was glad when Vulcan was destroyed as Vulcans aren't even how they should be anymore. Even Spock's father was saying how much he "loves" his wife and Spock removed himself from command because he was too emotional. Wrinkly Spock was talking about how he needs friends or something. What's happened????
The thing that made me cringe and which gave me surprise was Leonard Nimoy's appearance. Despite his entire past having been erased (and therefore he shouldn't exist), the same old wrinkly Leonard Nimoy Spock is still living long and prospering luckily on the exact random ice planet and luckily the almost same location onto which the new Kirk was jettisoned. What luck! Even luckier is that the new Scotty was on the same planet and nearby too! Damn, that was so lucky it must've been destiny! Apparently, this dreck of a film was good enough for wrinkly Spock to appear in but Star Trek: Generations wasn't? Perhaps they offered him more money I don't know. He's certainly "sold out" by appearing in this tripe.
I'm now going to purge my mind by watching a few old Original Series episodes. Avoid if you're a Star Trek fan. If you have time check out startrekxisucks.blogspot.com and read the "100 reasons why it sucks."