Abrams, just make a Star Wars movie, already.

Rating: 3/10 (23 May 2013)

My disappointment comes not from being a disillusioned Trekkie (would I even qualify for that?) but from the nice bit of Summer escapism that never panned out.
Abrams' "Star Trek Into Darkness" bursts onto the screen, guns blazing. It's a flashy, loud, sensory barrage that never lets up; like a fistful of speed pills on the big screen. Sometimes this attitude works, mostly it doesn't, and I often wished Abrams would stop moving the damn camera (one static shot here or there won't kill you, man). It's dizzying.
One of the problems is that there is a staggering amount of story material for one movie. They tease a war with the Klingons, touch on terrorism (9/11, you know it), play with the idea of making the now-non-wheelchair-ridden Admiral Pike the captain of the Enterprise again, there's a lover's quarrel between Spock and Uhura, Kirk learns some hard lessons (or maybe he doesn't, we're not sure), and then there's John Harrison, the terrorist bad guy - no wait, the bad guy's Peter Weller - oh, OK, it's really Harrison. Who's really Khan. Why?
The writers of "Star Trek Into Darkness" might have had something if they weren't so concerned with "Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan". It looms large over everything in this movie. Every repurposed line, every recycled plot point, they're all reminders that I could be watching a much better movie, instead. Orci, Kurtzman and Lindelof are too happy remixing the lore without respecting it.
Why the big reveal that Harrison is Khan? Harrison was a good enough bad guy character in his own right, with his own motivation. Better than Nero, and good enough to stand on his own. And why would Spock Prime be consulted on this guy if the Cumberbatch and Montalban characters are apples and oranges? Why kill off Kirk if he's just going to be resurrected before end credits? We already know there's magical blood to fix him; it just cheapens a (well-acted, at least) death scene. I have to stop here, because the list will seem like nitpicks. But it also means that because of these constant callbacks, "Into Darkness" never gets the chance to stand as its own movie.
It's the uninspired writing that steeps this movie in mediocrity, and that's what's most disappointing. The filmmakers are too interested in reexamining, deconstructing, and rehashing the past, instead of taking us somewhere new. Nod, don't pilfer.
I want the imagination back.
3/10