Wednesday, August 17, 2016

Star Trek: Beyond, and Update.

No matter what I say, I did enjoy this movie.



     First comes the update.  I finished my second edit of Grimmack and I'm very happy with where the book is right now.  Both passes so far have been looking at wording and adding a little more attention to detail.  I feel the story it good and compelling and Grimmack is probably the best protagonist I've written.  Still a few characters I would like to shine a little more, but I'm happy with where I am.  After this edit I have a couple places I plan on submitting the story.

     Now to the meat.  Like I said earlier, when I watch a move I'm going to be doing a review from now on, because I can.  I like movies, I like to share opinions, and at the bottom I will say how I would have done some things different from a writing perspective.  At that point, and I will warn again, there will be spoilers because I will be discussing what I would have done differently.  I will still try and keep the spoilers light, but they will live there.

     This movie takes place three years into the Enterprises mission.  The crew we know is there, and they are all, well, as expected.  I have no complaints about the acting in the movie, but I have no praise either.  Everyone played their part nicely, but nothing made me look at someone and say, "Oh, that is amazing!"  It's all good for the crew.

     The plot on the other hand, is a mess.  It suffers from the matrix of convenience the other Star Trek Movies have.  For example in the first reboot Captain Kirk gets thrown on a deserted planet, and it just happens to be the one old Spock is living on. There are coincidences like that throughout.  Three movies through and this crew has to be the luckiest folks alive.  Well, except for the red shirts.  The resolution is also shaky.  My brother who went with me voiced it as, they Independence Dayed the final fight between the Federation and the enemy fleet, swarm?  Well, lets say we both thought of Zerg when we saw how they operated, but unlike Zerg they had a convenient weakness.

     The Action is great.  This is where the movie really excels and to be honest, the characters and plot often feel like they are there just to frame cool fight scene X around.  In the action scenes they often use all the space around them.  There are tricks played with gravity and space, and there are moments where your brain shuts off and you enjoy the spectacle of everything.

     Over all I would give this movie a 6.5 to a 7.  It is a flawed movie, but it's enjoyable.  Just don't think too hard.  Really don't, every time I start to think it brings more questions than answers.  More about that below...

So, this is where you hop off the bus if you don't want SPOILERS.

I mean it, below the trailer here SPOILERS are free game.


     The first thing here, is simplify the plot line.  There is just too much that doesn't hold up if you take the time to think about it.  The biggest thing for me was the villain after his big reveal.  You can't tell me that you can spend an extended amount of time on a planet, have the intelligence to build a giant fleet of robots? (They never actually explain what his followers are, creature or robot) and you can't find a way to make it home?  Really?  The plot needs to be something that holds up to questioning.  How did the villain get the ability to make an army? And out of who or what?  It just is never explained.   

     The enemy fleet is beaten by an use of technology that left me scratching my head.  Not so much that what they did worked, but the fact the ships just started blowing up.  They weren't hitting each other.  They didn't just stop and drift, they blew up.  It was an awesome effect but it made no sense.  I would have rather they managed to McGyver an EMP that send out a big enough wave that shut the enemy down.

    I would kill the convenience.  It makes things feel to easy at time for the characters.  This thing needs to reach terminal velocity, well it happens to be on the planets tallest cliff.  The villain conveniently forgot this thing was here? Well, lets be happy about that and don't question.  (By the way, if you are an engineer and you develop a ship that needs to hit terminal velocity to activate your impulse drive, WTF? Why would you ever, ever, ever create a feature like that?  If you are an engineer and can answer this, feel free!)  The story is more interesting if it doesn't depend on convenience.  

    Needless to say, I think this movie would have benefited the script being looked over by someone who deals in physics and/or futuristic technology.  It would have helped.  A lot.

    That is my opinions up front about this, what would you change if you could edit this script?  Even better, what would you keep the same and why?  Thank you for taking the time to read, and feel free to share your opinions.

Ben Marble

If you want to support me and my writing endeavors feel free to pick up one of my short stories at Amazone.com/Kindle 

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