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Star Trek Into Darkness
USA 2013
produced by J.J. Abrams, Damon Lindelof, Bryan Burk, Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci, Jeffrey Chernov (executive), David Ellison (executive), Dana Goldberg (executive), Paul Schwake (executive) for Bad Robot, Paramount, Spyglass Entertainment
directed by J.J. Abrams
starring Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Benedict Cumberbatch, Zoe Saldana, Karl Urban, Simon Pegg, Peter Weller, Alice Eve, Anton Yelchin, John Cho, Bruce Greenwood, Noel Clarke, Nazneen Contractor, Amanda Foreman, Jay Scully, Jonathan Dixon, Aisha Hinds, Heather Langenkamp, Leonard Nimoy
written by Robert Orci, Alex Kurtzman, Damon Lindelof, created by Gene Roddenberry, music by Michael Giacchino, special effects by Atomic Fiction, ILM, Pixomondo
Star Trek, J.J. Abrams' Star Trek, Star Trek (original crew), Khan
review by Mike Haberfelner
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Kirk (Chris Pine), captain of the Enterprise, gets demoted because of a
plunder on an unexplored planet he was to survey. Then though, terrorist
Khan (Benedict Cumberbatch) attacks Starfleet command and single-handedly
kills quite a few commanding officers including Kirk's mentor Pike (Bruce
Greenwood). Then he makes an escape onto an uninhabited planet in the
Klingon Empire. Kirk is re-instated as captain, and he makes it his
mission to hunt down and kill Khan - but it has to be a covert operation,
because the Federation and the Klingon Empire are on the bring of all-out
war. Admiral Marcus (Peter Weller) of the Federation though even grants
Kirk 72 super-secret torpedoes to do the job - much to the dismay of
Scottie (Simon Pegg), who actually quits his service on the Enterprise
since he refuses to travel with these warheads without knowing what's
inside. On the supposedly uninhabited planet in the Klingon Empire, Kirk
and crew run into a Klingon patrol and are almost killed ... when they are
saved by Khan, who then gives himself up to Kirk. Mission accomplished? No,
because presently the Enterprise's warpdrive is damaged - and Khan's many
hints cause Kirk to have one of the torpedoes opened, which he finds out
to contain a cryogenically frozen body. Khan it turns out was a
genetically engineered superhuman frozen 300 years ago with his crew, and
was defrosted only recently by admiral Marcus to ... well, do something.
But Khan was a madman from day one, so Marcus decided to ditch him - by
having him start a war with the Klingon Empire, which in turn would
fortify Marcus's own position in the Federation and would turn the
Federation into the military operation he'd like to lead. Presently,
Marcus shows up with his new super-battleship to blow the Enterprise to
Kingdom Come - but somehow Scottie has snuck onto the ship and sabotaged
its weapon systems. Kirk decides to board the other ship, but he has to
take Khan with him because Khan knows the ship and is one hell of a
fighter. Of course, Kirk and Khan manage to take over the other ship, and
Khan also brutally kills Marcus - then he takes Kirk and company hostage
and exchanges them only for the torpedoes containing his 72 frozen
buddies. Once he has his hands on the torpedoes though, he wants to blow
up the Enterprise - but the torpedoes have been armed and they blow up his
ship instead - ouch! Meanwhile, the Enterprise has reached the
gravitational pull of earth and is endangered to crash onto it - but
giving his own life, Kirk saves his crew and ship. Then Khan's ship,
despite having been blown up, crashes into San Francisco, and Khan
survives the crash unscathed. Now Spock (Zachary Quinto) wants his revenge
on Khan and they have a fistfight taking them to half of remarkably
undamaged San Francisco - until Spock's girlfriend Uhura (Zoe Saldana)
intervenes and stuns Khan ... you see, it needs Khan's superblood to
revive Kirk ... so yes, everything ends happily. Star Trek
Into Darkness is by far not the best of most thoughtful film of the
series, rather an a little pointless collection of the best moments of the
original series and the movies, especially Star Trek II: The Wrath of
Khan, Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, and of course Star
Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country - but by and large, Star Trek
Into Darkness is also one thing: Escapist fun. Most of the more
interesting ideas in this movie are buried under yet another action
setpiece, and the moments when the movie goes for depth (like when Spock
explains why he chooses to show no feelings) are little more than tired
clichées. Plus neither Chris Pine nor Zachary Pinto really convince in
their respective roles. Plus, the finale is drawn out waaay too long and
gets sillier with every new twist - but at least, as long as you're
sitting through the film you'll find yourself pleasantly entertained. It's
not a film that will stick with you, mind you, more cinematic fast food of
a blockbuster quality, but you definitely could do much much worse.
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