moooovies
Morgan and I went to see Star Trek Beyond last night. The non-spoilery version is that we both loved it and both of us think it's the best of the reboot movies so far. It feels like Trek, which the first two didn't quite. Note that I really did love the first two (obviously; see icon) but this was just awesome.
Some of it was hard to watch, because there's a lot of really good Kirk and Chekov moments and they're going to have to kill him off before the next movie because there's no way to recast him.
They also wrote Nimoy's death into the movie, with the death of Ambassador Spock, and that was hard even though it felt natural as part of the movie. (I teared up during the credits because you get "In loving memory of Leonard Nimoy" and then "For Anton" and just...ugh.)
Things I loved: There was no Kirk romantic subplot despite there being two alien women involved. There was a lot of Spock and Bones bits and banter and they just nailed it. It never felt over the top but it was wonderful.
But the biggest thing that hit me about this movie was the philosophy of it. Kirk/Federation stands for strength with unity. That kept getting hammered home over and over, while the bad guy (Idris Elba who I didn't recognize due to makep for a long time) was arguing that war is how you get change and progress and...
Okay. If you haven't read my Trek stuff, you may not get why this matters to me, but...I've written a lot of philisophical conversations in those universes, and one of the things I kept coming back to was that Khan and his family know the ways of war. They are warriors, and always will be, and the question then becomes is there a place for them in the Federation? And in one universe I said there was but in the rest of them I'm saying there isn't.
Elba's character never evolved past the need to be a soldier, to fight a war for someone. In what I've written, Khan and his family have tried to do that. There's a lot of "We've had enough of war" in the story, especially WC, and discussions about how to find peace between the Federation and the Klingons.
But what I keep coming back to in my universes, and what Khan and the augments keep pointing out, is that the price of peace is that you have to be willing to defend it. Not everyone in the galaxy is going to be friendly (hello Beyond) and without the ability to defend what you stand for, it can get taken away by someone more ruthless.
Edison (Elba's character's name) kept looking for a war, but the difference between him and my augments is that they're looking for peace--but they're willing to fight a war to get there. In WC they basically did that, and then the question becomes what next?
I kept thinking that I would have loved to put Edison and Khan in a room together and have them talk about it, because I think I've evolved Khan in ways Edison didn't. So I have all these ideas for philisophical discussions that will happen at places in my universes based on some of this, and I'm thinking about ways to write in the planet and scenarios from Beyond, although I'm not likely to get anywhere near it for a while. WC will end before they start their interstellar adventures, and FF is done and I'm not actively working on a sequel (I did sort of start one but it's on hold).
But this, to me, is one of the hallmarks of Trek. That it could be totally silly at times (the opening of Beyond has some hilarious moments in it and the line "I tore my shirt again"), but also bring up these philisophical questions about humanity, and the nature of it, and what we could be if we tried.
I've said on multiple occasions that my take on the Trek reboot universe is darker than Roddenberry's original concept of the universe, and I think that I've done a decent job of trying to explain why that is and why I've made the choices I have. This movie did a good job of capturing the dark side of the galaxy but not at expense of its good things. Strength through unity gets hammered into you over and over again, and that is classic Roddenberry. Infinite diversity in infinite combinations and all that.
I also really liked Jim's character arc, because some of what he goes through is very, very similar to ways I've written him in id-fic. He hasn't had much of a role in WC, but I think there will be some discussions coming up before the story ends (speaking of that, Chapter 77 is up and I might be able to finish by chapter 80 but I'm not wholly certain.
But oh, this movie made me happy.
tl;dr movie rocks, go see it.
This entry was originally posted at http://blueraccoon.dreamwidth.org/1374712.html. Please comment there. |
comments
Some of it was hard to watch, because there's a lot of really good Kirk and Chekov moments and they're going to have to kill him off before the next movie because there's no way to recast him.
They also wrote Nimoy's death into the movie, with the death of Ambassador Spock, and that was hard even though it felt natural as part of the movie. (I teared up during the credits because you get "In loving memory of Leonard Nimoy" and then "For Anton" and just...ugh.)
Things I loved: There was no Kirk romantic subplot despite there being two alien women involved. There was a lot of Spock and Bones bits and banter and they just nailed it. It never felt over the top but it was wonderful.
But the biggest thing that hit me about this movie was the philosophy of it. Kirk/Federation stands for strength with unity. That kept getting hammered home over and over, while the bad guy (Idris Elba who I didn't recognize due to makep for a long time) was arguing that war is how you get change and progress and...
Okay. If you haven't read my Trek stuff, you may not get why this matters to me, but...I've written a lot of philisophical conversations in those universes, and one of the things I kept coming back to was that Khan and his family know the ways of war. They are warriors, and always will be, and the question then becomes is there a place for them in the Federation? And in one universe I said there was but in the rest of them I'm saying there isn't.
Elba's character never evolved past the need to be a soldier, to fight a war for someone. In what I've written, Khan and his family have tried to do that. There's a lot of "We've had enough of war" in the story, especially WC, and discussions about how to find peace between the Federation and the Klingons.
But what I keep coming back to in my universes, and what Khan and the augments keep pointing out, is that the price of peace is that you have to be willing to defend it. Not everyone in the galaxy is going to be friendly (hello Beyond) and without the ability to defend what you stand for, it can get taken away by someone more ruthless.
Edison (Elba's character's name) kept looking for a war, but the difference between him and my augments is that they're looking for peace--but they're willing to fight a war to get there. In WC they basically did that, and then the question becomes what next?
I kept thinking that I would have loved to put Edison and Khan in a room together and have them talk about it, because I think I've evolved Khan in ways Edison didn't. So I have all these ideas for philisophical discussions that will happen at places in my universes based on some of this, and I'm thinking about ways to write in the planet and scenarios from Beyond, although I'm not likely to get anywhere near it for a while. WC will end before they start their interstellar adventures, and FF is done and I'm not actively working on a sequel (I did sort of start one but it's on hold).
But this, to me, is one of the hallmarks of Trek. That it could be totally silly at times (the opening of Beyond has some hilarious moments in it and the line "I tore my shirt again"), but also bring up these philisophical questions about humanity, and the nature of it, and what we could be if we tried.
I've said on multiple occasions that my take on the Trek reboot universe is darker than Roddenberry's original concept of the universe, and I think that I've done a decent job of trying to explain why that is and why I've made the choices I have. This movie did a good job of capturing the dark side of the galaxy but not at expense of its good things. Strength through unity gets hammered into you over and over again, and that is classic Roddenberry. Infinite diversity in infinite combinations and all that.
I also really liked Jim's character arc, because some of what he goes through is very, very similar to ways I've written him in id-fic. He hasn't had much of a role in WC, but I think there will be some discussions coming up before the story ends (speaking of that, Chapter 77 is up and I might be able to finish by chapter 80 but I'm not wholly certain.
But oh, this movie made me happy.
tl;dr movie rocks, go see it.
This entry was originally posted at http://blueraccoon.dreamwidth.org/1374712.html. Please comment there. |
comments