Great, BUT beware the PARADOXES of Time Travel and Alternate Realities!

Rating: 9/10 (13 May 2009)

I've always had issues with time travel and the inherent paradoxes. Beyond that, alternate realities/alternate time lines is another issue for me, and there were very many of them in all the ST TV series.
One time in "Yoyager" it became so obvious a crewmen asked Captain Janeway about the paradoxes, and she replied quizzically, "the best thing to do is just not think about them".
Usually, broken time lines end up back to normal, but in this film nothing ends up as it was.
Remember the infamous episode of "Dallas" when an entire season of shows was wiped out as they were depicted merely as a dream? That is what this "Star Trek"movie just did on a gigantic scale - wiped out EVERYTHING we saw and know and accept as a given as part of the "canon". No Federation-Klingon Alliance, perhaps no Borg, and on and on.
In the movie, in the future, Spock fails to reach Romulus in time to create a singularity to save that world from a supernova. How exactly that was Spock's fault I failed to discern.
But Nero's Romulan ship, a mining ship, went with Spock's vessel through a singularity (created too late), and somehow went back through time instead of being scattered to the subatomic level or turned into pure energy, or whatever happens in a Black Hole. Romulus was destroyed by the supernova.
Nero blamed Spock, and somehow every planet in the Federation. This is not logical, and if Nero is merely insane, well, that detracts from his validity as a villain. Khan was not insane, certainly not to that degree.
Nero manages to drill a hole into a defenseless Vulcan, insert some "red matter", that can create a singularity, and this all of Vulcan and six billion people are destroyed, while Spock watches! Off next to Earth, which was also equally defenseless, except for their relatively few star ships. The excuse for that was they were off elsewhere on another assignment.
Well, after some heroics, Nero and his ship get sucked into another singularity and they vanish. To reappear in the sequel, in the present, past or future?? Who knows.
So Vulcan is gone in the film. Romulus is still there as it got destroyed only in the future. Kirk, while still a cadet at the academy, get command of the Enterprise and, at the film's end, permanent promotion from the Federation from mere cadet to captain! Puhleeze.
Why can't Spock go back through another singularity and change the time line?? How one can determine where in the past or future you will end up in going through one of those I can not figure out.
So, there is no single reality. There is any number of time lines depending on who changes what in the past. as I said, I always had issues with this. And also as I said, even Spock made a reference at the end to "cheating". It does make it easier for the screenwriters to just blow up everything that happened in the Star Trek world and "canon".
Weirdest paradox, at the end. Young Spock meets old Spock, and they have a conversation!! Think about that. It should be impossible.
So, you can see the paradoxes. Right captain Janeway? What's that, captain? "Just don't think about them"?? Isn't that "cheating", as Spock said? Guess so. As with so many shows, be it "24" or whatever, suspension of disbelief is required.
So turn off your scientific logic and just enjoy the fun. But remember, like Vulcan, everything you knew about the Star Trek universe is now gone - at least until someone goes back and corrects the time line! The movie is PG-13, and almost a PG. I would have preferred an R with some real gore.
Superb special effects, sound effects, score, set design, costumes, etc. Well acted, and many touches that are reminiscent of episodes, scenes or events from the original series.
The interior of the Enterprise looked nothing like that on the cheesy set of the first TV series, thankfully.
When did Romulans become giant super-powerful bald guys covered in what looked like Maori facial tattoos?? Or was that supposed to be only typical to that crew? Of course, the Federation first saw Romulans quite late, in "The Balance of Terror" episode.
Major Plot Hole: apparently both Vulcan and Earth were totally defenseless without so much as a phaser bank available. Even Star Fleet headquarters in California, a population center, had no defense, neither shields, nor phasers, and certainly not photon torpedoes. Nothing. That big "drill" in the film was easily knocked out with light hand-held weapons.
Minor Plot Hole: The Romulan vessel was not originally some all-powerful doomsday machine from another race; it was a working mining vessel. Even though from the not too distant future, it all too easily handled not only Federation but Klingon warships.
Winona Ryder played Spock's mother! Who dies. Ben Cross played his father Sarek, now that Mark Lenard is dead. And Leonard Nimoy played one of the Spocks. Speaking of Spock, a much thinner and less stacked version of Uhura makes out with Spock in the film. And when did they become an item??