Abrams' Trek 2: The Con of Wrath

Rating: 2/10 (28 January 2020)

Ye gods! Fresh from their latest disgracing of the Star Trek name, J. J. Abrams and friends are at it again with "Star Trek Into Darkness," one of the most ironically appropriate titles in history (missing colon notwithstanding). If public reaction to the previous movie taught this creative team anything, it's that nobody cares about loyalty to lore or character as long as the action is frenetic enough to keep them from actually paying attention. There is so much wrong with this movie that to list every individual problem would make this review a novel. And while this movie is certainly deserving of such an epic thrashing, for the sake of your patience, dear reader, I'll try to keep this brief...ish.
"Into Darkness" picks up where its predecessor left off: with a gaggle of idiots controlling the Enterprise. Not only do Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Uhura, and Scotty still act nothing like their original counterparts, it's even clearer now how much they DON'T deserve to serve on a starship, let alone command one. Kirk has no respect for the authority of his superiors, and none of Kirk's subordinates respect him. Officers will cut their captains off mid-sentence, because they're having arguments with their boyfriends, and heaven forbid a Starfleet mission interrupt that! I've seen Cartoon Network shows that depict military command structure more respectfully.
When a chunk of Starfleet's leadership is killed by some guy named John Harrison (played by Benedict Cumberbatch), Admiral Marcus orders Kirk to follow Harrison to the Klingon homeworld and kill him - specifically, by bombing him. A Starfleet admiral ordering Kirk to bomb the Klingon capital? Won't that start a war? Yes, and that's the (predictable) twist the film is building to: Marcus is the villain, roping Starfleet into a pointless war for his own reasons. And John Harrison isn't the fugitive's real name. His REAL name... is KHAN. Dun dun duuun!
You remember Khan, right, from Star Trek II? The original Khan (the REAL Khan) was played by Mexican actor Ricardo Montalbán. Benedict Cumberbatch is British. I'm not going to accuse the film of racism, because I'm convinced none was intended; I think they just wanted Cumberbatch's star power. But it is UNBELIEVABLY distracting to have Khan randomly turn into a British guy! Am I meant to believe that time-travel nonsense with Nero's stupid red matter somehow changed Khan's nationality? Khan was in suspended animation before all that started; it wouldn't have affected him!
Admiral Marcus proves too bland a villain, so the film has Khan bump him off and take the helm. This allows Cumberbatch to show off how he can't possibly compete with Montalbán in this role. Montalbán's Khan, while cunning and ruthless, was still dashing enough to woo one of Kirk's crew into helping him take over the ship. Cumberbatch's Khan is a robot: cold, dry, bereft of the faintest ghost of charisma. Maybe Benny knew he couldn't outdo Ricky, because it doesn't feel like he's even trying. Were this the first ever on-screen appearance of Khan, nobody would remember him.
"Into Darkness" shares its predecessor's penchant for mindless spectacle. Remember how Kirk and Khan used actual strategy in Star Trek II: two tactical geniuses exploiting each other's errors in a deadly game of space chess? Well, forget that! This ain't your daddy's Trek, this is NEW Trek, where conflicts are solved by just running in, guns blazing, and leveling cities! Who wants to watch Kirk struggle to preserve as many lives as possible when we can have a hot Carol Marcus posing in her underwear! Cheap sex appeal and 'splosions! We condemn Michael Bay for making movies like this! Why does J. J. Abrams get a pass!?
The story flies apart if you think about it for even one minute (more than the writers did, I'm sure!). Harrison/Khan beams directly to Kronos from light-years away; if transporters can beam you to other planets, why bother with starships? Khan was a super-soldier in TOS, but here he's given outright superpowers: he takes phaser shots head-on and barely flinches, can be beaten savagely by multiple people without apparent injury, and possesses super-blood that can raise the dead. Yes, really, RAISE THE DEAD! PLEASE don't question it!
But the greatest insult is the ending: not content to lift only the villain from Star Trek II, the writers lifted THE WHOLE CLIMAX! Remember when Spock sacrificed himself to save the Enterprise? Abrams and crew remade that scene, almost verbatim, but with Kirk as the sacrifice instead of Spock. Ignoring, if you can, that this is blatant plagiarism, it fails on EVERY level. The original scene was heartbreaking because we'd had a whole series AND two movies to explore the friendship of Kirk and Spock, and now here Kirk was helpless to do anything but watch Spock die. If "Into Darkness" thinks ripping that off will get me misty-eyed, it's tragically mistaken: you can't convince me that new Kirk and Spock are friends when all they ever do is bicker with each other! Spock's death in "Wrath of Khan" tied into the idea of Kirk never having faced a no-win situation. What idea does Kirk's death touch on in "Into Darkness," other than that today's writers can't create new material without plundering yesterday's masterpieces?
And that is the rot at the heart of these reboots: they CANNOT stand on their own. The writers lack the talent to create anything compelling, so they slap on a recognizable brand name to trick fans into buying it. "Abrams' Trek" is content to reap a profit off the classic series without paying respect to it. It resurrects characters, recycles plots, regurgitates ideas from past Trek without any clue what made them work in the first place. Rather than making something new we could look back on fondly someday, it dooms itself to mediocrity by palely imitating the work of the more talented artists who came before. We will always remember Shatner as Kirk, Montalbán as Khan, and Star Trek II as a masterpiece. "Into Darkness" will be forgotten, lost to the dust of time, forever trapped in the shadows of its forerunners. Resistance is futile.