24 replies to this topic

[Selena]

So, for the Trekkies of the forum, the teaser for "Into Darkness" was released.





Thoughts?

I have researched literally nothing about this movie so far, so I have no idea what the plot is. Wiki's not exactly forthcoming on info, either.

....


....


KHAAAAAAN?

[Veteran]

The reboot made me a fan after being largely indifferent to Trek as a whole.

If Cumberbatch isn't Khan they really need to tell us who he is, because the anticipation could ruin it.

[Egann]

Not looking forward to it. I've spent a few minutes thinking about this, and what little I do know is turning into a laundry list of things I don't like.

Oh, don't get me wrong. It's J.J. Abrams, so at worst it will be a decent movie, but is the best you can really do recycle old characters? It's not like The Wrath of Khan is sacred ground or something, but it wasn't a "decent" movie. It was a good one. I think it's fair to expect a remake to be better than the original, and I don't think this team is up to that.

Edited by Egann, 06 December 2012 - 07:58 PM.

[Selena]

But it wouldn't really be a remake. If it was just a strict rehash of Wrath of Khan, then yeah. But this is on an alternate timeline without any of the lead-up that Wrath had. It'd been an alternate version of Space Seed, if nothing else. Except instead of being able to stop him and send him into exile, someone -- whether it's Kirk or someone else -- allows him to return to Earth and resume the age of conquest that he had left behind prior to his initial freezing. Which would pretty much be the worst case scenario.

But, of course, it might not be Khan at all. Khan's technically supposed to be of mixed Indian descent, not a pasty white English guy. Could just be some rogue ex-Starfleet officer or someone else who got slighted in the past. That's probably the biggest indication that it's not him, really. Khan's darker-skinned and dark-haired.

Could be one of the other old superhuman warlords, though.

[Sir Turtlelot]

But, of course, it might not be Khan at all. Khan's technically supposed to be of mixed Indian descent, not a pasty white English guy.

The villain is obviously Picard. They're trying to pin the Trek community against one another.


On a more serious note, I am looking forward to this movie, given that the first one was really good.

[Veteran]

We Brits can play any evil role.

Or Gandhi.

[JRPomazon]

If this story doesn't have Khan in it, I'm going to be a smidge disappointed. I've been having that idea building up in my head for a good while now, it feels weird for it to be anything else at this point.

[Egann]

This isn't exactly the first time I've heard that the villain of the new movie is Khan. And really, it's the best explanation of the trailer; in Trek, the focus is almost always on the cast, so very few villains in the Star Trek universe are what you would call monologuers.

To give you a comparison, you can watch ALL THREE 2009 trailers here. Like I said, the talking is main cast members or people talking to them about them. The only real exception I can think of off the top of my head is Nemesis...which, upon further research, IS a Wrath of Khan remake in the purest sense of the word.

So 90%+ chance of Khan.


Obviously, like Lena said, this wouldn't be a pure remake of Wrath of Khan. In the new timeline Khan and Kirk have had no contact, and more to the point the images are (presumably) on Earth. None of Wrath of Khan occurred anywhere close to Earth. And there's no evidence Genesis will be involved, to boot. So no, it won't be "another" one or a remake in the strict sense of the word, but it will be the same characters in a similar character dynamic.

And therein lies the problem. That kind of remake is only worth remaking if it reveals something about the characters which the original did not. I'm skeptical this movie will do that. Even without Khan being involved, I'm not certain my opinion would change; I watch the trailer and I see a hot blonde for Kirk to inevitably get in bed with, and villain sounding like a calm, cool, and collected boss, but who's actually blowing limpdick smoke as some form of foreplay. And then shit blows up.

I am not exactly impressed.

[Selena]

Apparently the villain is already in canon, someone we already know, so there is that. There was talk that it was Gary Mitchell, the mind-power 'villain' of one of the old Star Trek pilots, but they apparently killed him off already in associated comic books. But it was also a comic book, so. That would make more sense since he IS a pasty white guy.

But a fun twist would be that it's one of the other eugenic super-soldiers on the Botany Bay, and he tries to overthrow Khan. Since they're all ambitious little shits. Kirk-Khan buddy cop team-up go.


Well they already made it so Spock and Bones like each other, so stranger things have happened.

[Egann]

I was actually thinking something similar; what would need to happen for Khan to become a good guy? There seem to be three logical conditions.

1.) The great grandmother of all antagonists. No shit. If Kirk and Khan are working together, it needs to be the most badass thing of all time.

2.) Heroic death. Come on. Can we really let a good Khan live? I don't think so.

3.) Excellent character writing for the Khan. Viewers will be used to thinking of Khan as an antagonist and, at least initially, he should be. To bring him around would require a deft hand at developing the character and selling the change to the audience. I can't even think of a good way to do it off the top of my head.

I expect #3 alone means this one's impossible. I just glanced at the IMDB pages of the lead writers. I see Star Trek (2009), Transformers, Zorro, Van Helsing, and future projects like Ender's Game and a Mummy reboot. I wouldn't call these guys "hacks," because I do like some of their stuff, but those movies aren't exactly full of character writing.

...God, I hope it's not Khan. Khan quotes Shakespeare and Moby Dick so that you don't need to read those works to get what he said. These guys have archangel bounty hunters killing vampires with automatic crossbows. Please, for the LOVE OF GOD do not be Khan.

Edited by Egann, 07 December 2012 - 08:59 PM.

[Fin]

I was thinking Gary Mitchell until I actually watched the trailer. The bit about returning to have his revenge doesn't really fit Mitchell at all, whereas Khan has the back story with the Eugenics Wars. And the white guy thing honestly wouldn't surprise me. Just typical Hollywood racefail. ಠ_ಠ On the other hand, I thought it looked like they were trying to make Cumberbatch look more like Mitchell than Khan, and the blonde reminds me more of Elizabeth Dehner than Carol Marcus. Then again, she might be Chapel.

Anyway, I doubt I'll bother seeing this one, unless I have someone to go to the cinema with. I don't care all that much for Abrams Trek. I'll give him credit for giving me an awesome time at the cinema and restoring my interest in Star Trek, but ultimately Trek 2009 was pretty shallow, and I don't see anything here to make me think the sequel will be much better.

Edited by Finn the Human, 08 December 2012 - 10:17 AM.

[Jezzer]

I don't think it is Khan Noonien Singh...but instead I think this villian is another Augment, a follower of Khan's from the SS Botany Bay.

The SS Botany Bay held a total of 85 people - Khan and 84 of his followers - in suspended animation. When Kirk and the Enterprise originally stumbled across it not all of the people survived. Some individuals lost life support and died in the 250+ year suspended animation.

Perhaps in J.J. Abrams timeline Khan was the one who lost life support while in suspended animation and his followers are seeking revenge on the planet and successor to the society that "exiled" them.

---------------

A second theory I have is along the line of Augments. This villian could perhaps be either a production of Dr. Arik Soong - unlikely as this person would have to be over 100 years of age at the setting of the film...OR is a decendent of Dr. Arik Soong's Augments.

---------------

A third theory involves a scenario where the eco-terrorist Col. Phillip Green of WWIII had not died but instead was also exiled in a manner similar to Khan but returns in the future.

---------------

My final theory involves the Mirror Universe and the villian is a member of the Terran Empire.

Edited by Jezzer, 11 December 2012 - 09:05 PM.

[Oberon Storm]

John Harrison? Was he an augment?

[Jezzer]

He is not listed as an Augment per Memory Alpha but a lot of the Augments in the SS Botany Bay were not named.

[Veteran]

Go through the movie with Cumberbatch's character unnamed, everyone assumes he's Khan then right at the end reveal who he is and smash cut to the real Khan. End movie.

Trek nerd orgasm.

[Moriatti]

^Most likely scenario, then you get your trilogy.

And I was hoping for Klingons then real Romulans. Oh well.

I might watch this, the reboots are sleek and sexy, but not quite smart enough for me to call them Star Trek, but they do make some fun Summer Blockbusters.
However their set in one of the two best timelines to be sexy action, early Original Series, when space is really the frontier, and cowboy captains are what's needed. (The other one would be the Dominion War, but that will never see the big screen because nobody but me likes DS9.)

[Crimson Lego]

It was pretty awesome, with a ton of loud explosions and that cool warp speed path. I still can't decide whether it's better than '09 or not but Benedict Cumberbatch's acting was ridiculously good.

 

 

Excited to see what Abrams is planning for Episode VII.

[Selena]

'09 was better, but this one was still okay. Not amazing, but okay. Worth seeing in theaters, though, because of bigness.

 

People who never knew anything about Star Trek probably thought the villain was neat. Being an older fan, though, I was not overly amused. Cumberfluffles is a good actor, but the fault was in the writing. He's basically out-of-character throughout the entire movie.

 

The Enterprise crew is amazing, though. Scotty!

 

 

 

About the villain, for the two people who haven't already been spoiled about the Talia al-Ghul moment. And some other spoilery stuff:

 

Spoiler

 

They tried way way way way way WAAAAAY too hard to piggyback Wrath of Khan.

 

In fact, the new villain probably would have been way more enjoyable if he'd just been "John Harrison" throughout the entire thing. As Khan, infamous arch-nemesis, he's completely out of character. Khan wasn't just about super strength. He was super-smart, always one step ahead of the opposition, and viciously charming. He was seducing women on Kirk's crew, not someone who got turned into a puppet by an obviously-not-that-smart admiral. His crew being taken hostage is no excuse, because that sure didn't stop him back on the original series.

 

If he'd been made into an original character - or even just a different member of Khan's crew! - then it would have been a lot more palatable. Especially since Khan is written as a sinfully charismatic Indian man, not a brooding white British man. People were rather upset that one of the few not-white people in science fiction was recast as the ultimate white guy.

 

And the whole warp core thing with Kirk mirroring Spock's death in Wrath of Khan? Most of the depth and sad-times that came with that scene in Wrath of Khan were because Kirk and Spock had been friends for decades at that point, and the audience had known them just as long. These guys still barely know each other in this timeline, so the weight isn't there.

 

So, they basically pulled out two really big cards -- major character death and KHAAAAAAAN -- and wasted both of them. In my eyes.

 

Lesson learned? Trying to recreate the past never works. Write a new adventure.

[Oberon Storm]

Spoiler

New timeline. New Kahn. I thought he showed the same amount of intelligence and ruthlessness, though. Complaints about race are silly.

 

As for the emotion of the death scene, this I think should be looked at from a completely different angle. We have a Spock that is wrestling with his human half. Really trying to make sense of his emotions and what friendship is. I really like this Spock when he goes into a rage.

[Selena]

Spoiler

Khan was born several hundred years before the timeline split - so there shouldn't be much different about him other than how he got cracked out of the space freezer. I mean, I'm not a huge stickler about these kind of things. "Timeline split" was just convenient movie-code for "series reboot."

 

I'm less bothered by race and more bothered by his personality being off.

 

That said, the race thing is kind of a dick move given how Khan really is one of the few major roles in sci-fi designed for a not-white guy. Might be "silly" to you, but it illustrates how Hollywood will still - even subconsciously - avoid putting "brown people" in starring roles. Even when the role is written that way. It's not like there aren't a ton of decent Indian actors out there, lots of whom already get passed over for work due to how they look. There's not a lot about Cumberbatch that screams that he's believably a man named "Khan Noonien Singh" any more than it'd be believable that he's a man named "Lao Tzu" or "Sitting Bull."

 

And yes, the original actor wasn't Indian either. He was Mexican. But it was also the 60's and white people were still allowed to do yellowface instead of just hiring an Asian actor.

 

It would have been something that I'd more easily let slide - and I still do let it slide because something like that won't ruin a movie for me - if the character had... well, actually felt like Khan. Still think it would have been better to make Harrison a unique villain and save Khan for something bigger.

 

Finish this one by killing off Harrison, but not before he wakes up Khan from cryosleep. Bam. Instant scary cliffhanger setup for a huge third movie.

 

 

 

The movie was still enjoyable - often times more than enjoyable - despite these things. But I still think it was trying way too hard to resurrect Wrath of Khan.

[arunma]

Crap, I'm going to have to do most of this post in spoiler tags. But first...

 

My "problem" with the new Star Trek has always stemmed from the fact that I'm a Star Trek purist. My ideal Star Trek is one in which the characters spend two hours arguing about morality and ethics, and maybe at the end someone fires one phaser. After thinking about it for a really, really long time. Yes, this means I loved Star Trek: The Motion Picture. Sue me. It's not that I don't like a good action flick (I loved Transformers), but when I see Star Trek, I want to see Star Trek. Not an action movie. I've been able to appreciate the new Star Trek movie from 2009 by pretending that it's a Michael Bay movie that happens to have the Star Trek label incorrectly added. And along those lines, I absolutely loved Star Trek Into Darkness as well. It's not great as Star Trek. But it's amazing as a movie, and I think that the $8 I paid for it was well worth it. Hell, I wish I paid an extra $3 to see it in 3D.  The bad guy John Harrison seems to bear a similarity to Bane from the latest Batman.  He's a single man whose capable of striking terror into the hearts of ordinary people, and he's here to upset the status quo.  Yeah, that's not what you want to have in a Star Trek movie, where earth is supposed to be a utopia with no crime and definitely no terrorism.  But like I said, I'm pretending this movie isn't real Star Trek. Having said that, I do think it's closer to the ideals of Star Trek than its predecessor, so it gets additional props for that. OK, now for spoilers.

 

Spoiler

So regarding Lena's comments on Khan.  About Khan being "in character," I think he actually was fairly in line with the old Khan.  He did use cunning and guile as much as strength, after all.  In this movie, he's been awake in the 23rd century for presumably a few years now, and being a genius has adapted himself to contemporary technology.  He gained the trust some key people in Starfleet, and then managed to convince a guy in Section 31 to commit an act of terror by using his greatest weakness (i.e. his daughter) against him).  That's both clever and cold blooded.  He then managed to use Starfleet's own protocol against them by taking out a bunch of starship captains when they were together.  Oh, and he took advantage of a corrupt admiral.  None of that has anything to do with his physical strength.

 

Furthermore, I'd say that the parallels to Star Trek II are quite apt.  The whole idea behind the reboot (not that I am in favor of the reboot!) is that though the timeline was interrupted, there's a way that things are "supposed" to be.  In the first movie, it's made very clear that Jim Kirk simply ought to be captain of the Enterprise, and damn the way history has ended up playing out.  He ends up becoming captain, as he should.  And here, in Into Darkness, Khan ends up being a villain, as he should.  When Kirk gives his life for his crew, he says to Spock "it's what you would have done," and those of us who've seen Trek II know what he's talking about.  The scene with Kirk and Spock on opposite ends of the radiation shield was masterfully done.  Of course I totally saw Kirk's resurrection via Khan's blood from a mile away, but whatever.

 

Yeah, the whole thing with Khan not being Indian.  That was stupid.  With a name like "Singh," ain't no way he could be anything but Punjabi.  As an Indian I've got an obvious bias myself, but I'd like to see some badass evil Indians on screen.  Aw well, it's not like Ricardo Montalban was any more Indian.  We'll just chalk that up to the genetic modification process.  Clearly those incompetent 20th century geneticists accidentally turned him white.  It would have been hilarious, though, if they made a reference to Star Trek mythology and said something about how Khan ruled 1/4th of the world in the 1990's.

Edited by arunma, 21 May 2013 - 12:39 AM.

[Nevermind]

I bet cryogenic hibernation just does all sorts of crazy stuff to pigments. That's it. That's why.

 

 

Also, I'm not sure how you couldn't see his cunning. From the entire beginning of that film, he manipulated everyone's actions into getting him where he wanted to be:

 

Spoiler

On board a juggernaut of a ship that he pretty much designed and engineered, with his godly crew. The only thing he didn't count on was Spock lying to him as a half-human, and also being a damn dirty cheater and essentially consulting KahnFAQ from the FUTURE who knew EVERYTHING. Khan is a total boss. A total, non-cheating boss.

 

 

Arunma, it probably doesn't mean anything to the purists like yourself, but this is literally "alternate Star Trek". It's "new" and "more fitting with contemporary interests". It's still real Star Trek, it's just different Star Trek and not old Star Trek.

 

Still Real Star Trek.

Edited by Nevermind, 21 May 2013 - 07:02 AM.

[Selena]

I was very much aware of all this little manipulations through the film. It just... didn't feel like "him" to me.  He's smart. He's strong. But he's just kind of a repressed wet rag compared to the original, and more prone to stay under someone's heel until a situation presents itself.

[Nevermind]

Spoiler

Granted, he was awoken by Lord Admiral Robocop rather than Kirk and his boyfriend and was put to work designing warships under threat. Doesn't make for a very seductive, romantic, playboy character. He's manipulative, super-intelligent and now he's also vengeful. And he was "engineered" for genocide. Emotions are gone. He's madbro and he's playing it smart; taking opportunities to strike unexpectedly from beneath Starfleet heels.

[Selena]

Spoiler

Haha, the Vengeance was awesome looking and that warp battle was cool, but...

 

Come on, Khan may be a super-genius and obsessed with warfare, but the dude was sealed in a cryotube for several hundred years. Warp drive didn't even exist in his time. You wake up the equivalent of a super-powered caveman to design warships for you? Just 'cause you're smart doesn't mean you know jack about building spaceships, much less space warships. It's like asking Richard the Lionheart to engineer a  nuclear submarine.

 

Dammit Marcus, I'm a 90's warlord, not an astrophysicist.  =__=

 

 

 

 

But yeah, I'd still have preferred him to be an original character. It just would have been easier.

 

I mean, look at that guy. Mackin' women left and right, and even wife'd one of Kirk's crew. Kick up the smooth-talking, Cumberbatch.