My odd review: This film can only be validated by sequels.

Rating: Null/10 (8 May 2009)

Star Trek 2009(SPOILERS WITHIN!!!): I'm not really going to write much, but I'll do that good/bad thing I see is so popular anymore. The easy way out. But much of the nonsense has already been rehashed in various actual reviews (those being ones that give examples rather than "That was awesome man!!").
THE BAD: Most of it. They didn't even attempt to make the whole 'time traveling thru a black hole' thing make sense. Just muttered some nonsense and moved on.
The bridge design IS as bad as I feared. It is absolutely the most distracting thing I've ever seen on film. I can't believe someone thought all that 'stuff for the sake of stuff' was a good idea, or in any way needed.
As has been stated countless times: No plot. The issue of destiny is so forced they may as well have just started the film where it ended, and just had the 'plot' as the opening 20 min sequence, and given us a real story. (more on that later).
Space Diving. Nuff said.
Scotty was handled very badly. Tho we can blame the later Trek TOS films for the 'Scotty as comic relief', this was just over the top silly.
As I mentioned (and feared...and this was way before Eberts review), they don't even try to make any of the physics logical. The Space Diving scene is offset by the revelation to Scotty about beaming, and ...well...like Ebert said...why didn't they beam exactly??? Oh that's right ...a dumb action scene was needed.
There's so much more that's already been said over and over. This is just fluff. Lotsa 'splosions, some 'tacked on' feeling drama, and little or no attempt to really achieve anything else. That's the problem. The 'real' story is that they needed a device to restart the TOS time line, but they did it badly. There are so many ways they could have achieved the same outcome (starting a fresh universe), but in a smarter way. For instance the time travel could have been handled like it was in TOS, with slingshoting around the sun. An established Trek method of time travel.
Nero's changing of some history makes sense, but not all. I can accept the changes to the characters lives, but not the way things are built or engineered. I'm not talking about the 'look' (as in the set from the 60's), I'm talking about matters that Nero's interference would just have no bearing on. I'm still trying to figure out how Scotty doesn't live his 'normal' existence, because nothing Nero does would have affected his life. Not that we ever knew a lot about it anyway, but still.....another dumb example of lazy and awful writing.
THE GOOD: I like the cast. ALL of them. Yes even Chris Pine. He had all the swagger that a Kirk character should have. Everyone was aces in my book.
Other than the bridge design, the rest of the overhauls to Enterprise didn't bother me a much. Altho why the design of the outside of the vessel is changed fits into the "Well...what's that got to do with Nero altering time?" problem. I can live with it, but there's no reason the Enterprise shouldn't have looked EXACTLY (exterior) as in TOS. Nothing Nero did would change the basic engineering concepts and design concepts.
Oh the FX are good as well.
That's it. That's the good. Which brings me to my 'topic' statement:
MY HOPE: They take this wonderful cast and make some Trek with some meat on the bones. No pun intended.
If they can give us some TOS Trek stories that are well written, by serious sci/fi writers who know how to write a more character driven drama/adventure, this film is a win, IMO. I wouldn't even mind them 'remaking' some TOS episodes and sort of doing what George Romero did when he wrote the script for the Night of the Living Dead (1991) remake: Just throw a few clever curve balls in. I wouldn't even mind straight up longer versions of classic tales. Why not? This is all about 'bringing Trek to a new generation'. Well, give them a REAL taste of what Trek was about in future installments.
JJ did his job, no matter who likes it or doesn't. Trek is alive again.
But now that the job is done, Trek needs to go back to being something of substance again. Just get real writers, and possibly a new director the next time.
I often hear people rip on The Final Frontier , or Insurrection. At least those films had substance. Real drama, not forced.
JJ's (and Orci and the other turd writers) Star Trek is like an ice cream cone that melts before you're even half way thru. If they can manage on making this a film series with stories of substance, it could work.
--Rating: 5/10 (My "Worth seeing, but zero re-watchable value" rating).--