Galaxy Quest II - The Wrath of Fans

Rating: 6/10 (13 May 2013)

I am a life-long Star Trek fan. Not a "Trekkie", but someone who grew up with the series and later the films, both of which left a definite mark on me into maturity. The original I loved because it had wonderful characters played by wonderful actors, and clever, inventive worlds and possibilities, as well as often spine chilling horror (to a 7 yr old at least!) which still occasionally appears in my nightmares, but most of all I loved it because what was beneath all that. The use of Sci-fi to do what Swift and Voltaire, Wells and Verne, Bradbury and Clarke used it for – A Mirror to our own world in which to ask questions about ourselves and offer answers which were not always pleasant to hear. Here choices were hard, nothing was black and white and decisions and actions had tragic and emotionally crushing consequences. I remember being so moved by the series that even today I feel a lump in my throat and even a tear in the eye whenever I hear the famous theme tune that played out the latest emotionally exhausting Star Trek into Darkness once a week.
Everything must change of course, but recently we have been getting reboots which are praised as being "brilliant reinventions" but which are simple substitutions using established names and situations to tell pretty generic stories deprived of everything that made the originals so special. Now James Bond has become a dull manic depressive engaged in boring battles against feeble opponents and his own demons, Doctor Who has become a 45 minute parade of laser blasts and half-baked PC nonsense, and Star Trek has become a wham-bam-thank you mam testosterone filled shoot-em-up deprived of even the minimum vestige of its former self.
2009's "Star Trek" signalled the start of the "reinvention" which paved the way for the new style, and in its wake there was much speculation on what the sequel would contain. "Wrath of Khan", number II of the original series, was used as some sort of bar on which to judge its modern counterpart. Abrams and Lindof must have been listening because they've basically fashioned their own version of the story here, knowing of course that it would be judged against the original as a result.
Everyone will have to make their own mind up. Being a passionate lover of "ST2WOK" for a variety of reasons, many personal, I found the retake not just inferior but insulting, especially since this was "canon", and also cheap and unoriginal. Blowing your nose (not to mention any other bodily function) on a masterpiece doesn't improve it not make you a creative genius.
The story (spoilers) happens in the "alternate universe" of movie 1, and here Noonan Singh Khan, Indian warlord and genetically engineered superman/war criminal from 21st century Earth and his crew are picked up years earlier by militant Starfleet Admiral Marcus (Peter Weller) who wants to use Khans military mind-set to prepare a militarised arm of Star Fleet to fend off the growing Klingon threat, only for it to backfire in his face when Khan shows his true colours. Interestingly, that colour is white, since the Indian Khan, formerly played as an Indian in the usual Latin-Desi racial pass by Mexican Ricardo Montalban, is still Indian but now played by the ultra-white Anglo Brit actor Benedict Cumberbatch. How and why is never explained. Dr Carol Marcus (Here Alice Eve), Kirk's great love and future mother of his estranged son David, is here a sexy bob haired cheerleader who strips to her underwear for the sake of publicity since it's in every trailer and advert.
Khan starts out as villain, then becomes a sort of ally as Admiral Marcus suddenly becomes Dick Dastardly for the unforgivable sin of trying to make Star Fleet a credible defence against the Klingon threat (Anti-militarism is so cool you know, as well as so 2003) then Marcus becomes a goody and Khan becomes a villain again. Then there's the most idiotic thing ever, which is that Kirk virtually replays Spock's sacrifice in ST2 point for point, seemingly without irony, concluding with the mirror-imaged Radiation door scene and Spock shouting "Khhhaaaaaan!" into the air (Oh that is SO clever and deconstructionist!) Both ships crash into San Francisco, probably killing thousands of unacknowledged extras, followed by the new most idiotic thing ever, Rambo Spock and Khan having an endless beat down on, appropriately enough, flying garbage trucks until the inevitable happy ending occurs as ST3's rejuvenating planet gets condensed into something else that cures death. Of course when ST2 came out, NOBODY knew there was going to be a ST3 – That was the end of Spock and that's what made it so powerful. Here we know the series doesn't end this way, so it is all smoke and mirrors with an appropriate lack of stakes or real emotion. Everything stops and starts again every 35-40 minutes like most other Abrams works (MI3 and Super 8 come to mind)fashioning a loose patchwork rather than an cohesive single narrative.
The opening is also quite goofy, with The Enterprise underwater (?) and a bid to stop a planet from being destroyed by its active Volcano, which leads to twin themes of Kirk defying the rules (The Kobiashi Maru mindset) and of self-sacrifice, both, like the rest of the movie, nosing back to ST2.
The special effects are good, as are the designs and the 3D. Acting is OK, with everyone doing a passable imitation of the originals save Pine, who is still playing Kirk as a wild cowboy douche.
Exciting and interesting enough on its own, it nonetheless grievously disrespects the original, which it blatantly hijacks for its own ends. How you will feel about this depends on how you felt about the original film and indeed the original Rodenberry incarnation.