Today, we’ll beam aboard the Starship Enterprise to find out if director J.J. Abrams can seek out new life in his exciting reboot series with the big-screen sequel, “Star Trek Into Darkness.”
The film’s official synopsis explains that “after the crew of the Enterprise find an unstoppable force of terror from within their own organization, Captain Kirk (Chris Pine) leads a manhunt to a war-zone world to capture a one-man weapon of mass destruction.”
Who plays this epic villain? That would be one Benedict Cumberbatch, an English actor who refers to his ever-growing legion of fans as Cumberpeople. Well, sign me up, because I think I am a Cumberperson. I’ve tasted the Kool-Aid, and it’s good. Cumberbatch really dazzles. Did you know he was half ninja? All of his scenes are intense, but I didn’t know he could fight like that.
The entire cast returns, and the actors deliver their A-games. While the friendship among Spock (Zachary Quinto), Uhura (Zoe Saldana) and Kirk continues to stay interesting, you also have to love Simon Pegg as Scotty and Karl Urban as Bones. Everyone parodies the original characters they’ve inherited from the TV series just enough, but also brings something new to the table.
The toughest job belongs to Quinto. Believably playing a Vulcan is not easy, my friends. That’s like the Cirque du Soleil of acting. However, next time I want to see Anton Yelchin’s Chekov be central to the plot. Filmmakers owe him for making him run around and spout gibberish the whole time.
My only serious critique? The Klingons were robbed. I would have liked to see their small roles in the film bumped up a notch. It was like somebody ran out of money for make-up and costume design. I also would have thought they’d be larger. Do any of you know? Are Klingons smaller in person?
Critics are being a little tough on the movie — and if you ask me, that’s a compliment. If this were just some dumb, popcorn flick, people wouldn’t be dreaming of ways the franchise could have squeezed just a little more awesome out of this film. Measure it against your average summer action film, though, and I have got to say, this one, is out-of-this-world good.
I’m a fan!