Star Trek au-delà

Before I write a review I like to browse through the other comments posted first. To surmise, many have got it quite right, this is not the best Star Trek movie, but it is a good one. The story is reasonable, although there are plenty of plot holes that you have to overlook and not delve into them too deeply. I also think that the size of that deep space station is just OTT even for that century, it is far too advanced! Anyway, get over the minor flaws and you will begin to notice that they are starting to focus more on character development and interaction of the personalities within the crew. It is what real fans enjoy the most, including the odd bit of humour.

As for the highly negative reviews on here, please start to put your rankings in perspective, this is by no means a shocking movie and definitely is fit to join the Star Trek Universe. It really winds me up when people rank this movie in the same breath as some of the real shockers we have seen in the last few years!

Spoiler free review: I was lucky to go to the premiere in San Diego at comic con... the night was amazing but it ended with a super fun movie. That's the best word to describe it... fun.

The difference with the past 2 Trek movies was that unlike the original films we didn't bond with this cast over 100 or 200 episodes of slower paced TV. These guys were just tossed into it. This movie gives us an idea what a show with them would be like. It's impossible of course to do. But it was such a nice break form the overreaching drama from Into Darkness.

This is still serious and has tearful moments and sincere motivations from characters... but it's also fun. Some people forget the original trek as Justin Lin told the crowd at the premiere that the original series was fun. It was funny. It was a pure comedy at times. and he's right. This movie takes all the elements the series was... (serious, funny, action, fantasy) and mixes it into one giant movie. Including the Shatner like fist fight.

Loved it.

Dialogue from Simon Pegg and Doug Jung was absolutely natural to the characters and everyone had their moments. The scenes of different characters sharing moments with each other was great.

New characters Jayla is terrific. Sofia was great in the part.

It's sort of a typical Justin Lin movie too as in the set pieces, action scenes fx were simply amazing... breathless... the character moments fantastic, warm, sweet... the story was very good but some holes and confusion at times but it's so worth having that for the pure fun this is.

If you want a movie that has a lot of action, fighting and graphics, this is the movie for you. If you want a well developed plot and good acting, it just doesn't deliver. The acting is uneven. The Spock character seems to do the best job and is believable. Some of the others seem like they are at times still reading from the script. The old original Star Trek movies had well defined relationship stories in them but in this, it seems like the characters are secondary to the graphic presentations and fighting scenes. I would even say they don't click together like the original cast. So, to me it was entertaining to a certain extent, but disappointing in that the plot was not as developed as it could have been. The actress who played the "helper" in the end did seem to be very strong and believable.

OK, so I'm a Star Trek fan being old enough to have watched the original series BEFORE it was in re-runs! But Star Trek Beyond just plain disappoints. It's not terrible… but it's not great either.

It's Star Date 2263.2 and Kirk (Chris Pine) is into the third year of their "5 year mission" (which seems to somehow throw away a lot of potential sequel opportunities already doesn't it?). Less buoyant and confident than he used to be, Kirk is feeling a little emotionally 'Lost in Space': after all, as the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy put it "Space is big… REALLY big". Spock (Zachary Quinto) also receives some news of a personal nature that unsettles him. They are both in need of a vacation, and Starbase Yorktown (queue some spectacular special effects and an operatic Michael Giacchino track) appears to be able to offer them that. The crew disperse for a bit of R and R: Sulu (John Cho) goes off to spend time with his family (after the big internet furore, the gay aspect of this is very subtle); Kirk gets career advice from the Admiral; and Spock and Uhuru (Zoe Saldana) go their separate ways since – like Ross and Rachael – they are "on a break".

The reverie is rudely interrupted by the arrival of a frantic alien called Kalara (Lydia Wilson) from the other side of a dense nebula. She needs help to rescue her crew, stranded on a planet there. Kirk's rescue mission however goes far from to-plan, and he and his crew are caught in the clutches of the warlord Krall (Idris Elba).

What's nice about this film is that the core crew of Kirk, Spock, Uhuru, Bones (Karl Urban), Scotty (Simon Pegg), Sulu and Chekov (the tragically departed Anton Yelchin) gel together really nicely as an ensemble cast. The traditional by-play between the characters feels unforced, comedic and provides a warmth at the heart of the film. There is also a touching tribute to Leonard Nimoy, who died while the film was in pre-production, woven into the story of which I'm sure he would have approved.

Supporting the crew as a potential new character is the strikingly attractive and kick-ass Jaylah played by Sofia Boutella (the evil amputee Gazelle from "Kingsman").

There's also some fine and innovative alien technology on display with the 'swarm-like' alien fleet harking back (in an expanded scale) to the invulnerability of the nanites from an original episode.

Unfortunately, all of these positives are severely offset by a largely planet-bound Simon Pegg and Doug Jung story (didn't the woeful "Insurrection" teach writers that this tends not to be a good idea?) and action sequences that are so manically fast-moving that it is almost impossible to keep track of what exactly is happening. (Perversely, this is a film that might actually make more sense on the small screen than the big one, which is just BAD CINEMA!). There was even one point in a final fight scene where I seriously feared Kirk and Krall might have a 'sharing of mother's names' moment (if you know what I mean) but fortunately this script apocalypse is avoided.

At the conclusion the story actually makes no sense to me at all: without spoilers, it is difficult to discern exactly what the motivations of Krall actually were. Throw in a graphic in the final reel that looks like Krall is attacking the Death Star (no, seriously – watch for it!) and the concoction just doesn't hang together very well. I know Simon Pegg and director Justin ("Fast and Furious") Lin are huge Trekkers, but – sorry guys – this was a C- for me.

It's a mildly diverting popcorn movie, but with (for me at least) yet another disappointing film, its getting to the point where the best 'summer blockbuster' is likely to be Deadpool… and that was released in February!

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After being attacked by a huge swarm of unknown ships the crew of the Starship Enterprise are separated and spread across a mysterious planet, there they must search for each other and battle a new villain who is against all that the federation stands for.

Star Trek: Into Darkness was well received when first released but afterwards many fans changed their opinions and it began to receive less than lukewarm feelings from people who went back to watch it, due to it's non Star Trek feel. So with new writers (Simon Pegg and Doug Jung) and a new director (Justin Lin, known for directing some of the Fast and Furious films) is Star Trek Beyond able to recapture the original feeling of Star Trek? Yes, it more than does this. In fact this ,the third film in the new series of Star Trek movies, feels like an extended episode from the original series. There is a lot of fun to be had with this film and in all honesty it might actually have a running time that is just over two hours but when watching it the pace is so fast and the action is so well shot the running time only seems to be just over 45 minutes. Another thing that new director Lin has been able to successfully do is bring the audience into the actual adventure, the audience doesn't just watch the film they are almost taking part, they are made to feel as if they are in the same world, the exact same situations as the characters causing them to not only laugh along with them when there are comedic moments ,which nearly always hit the right mark, but also feel involved in the action and the adventure. The chemistry between all the characters is always on top form and all actors clearly get on well making the on screen chemistry more realistic especially between Kirk (Chris Pine), Spock (Zachary Quinto) and Bones (Karl Urban). The characters of Spock and Bones ,helped by Pegg and Jung's script, go together so well creating a really well thought out and timed double act while still keeping the frame of the original characters, still providing the much needed action and adventure that is vital to this sort of film. As for the Visual Effects ,next to Ghostbusters, they are some of the best to be seen on the big screen this year and go towards creating an even greater sense of realism and once again pulling the audience in with immense ease.

Fans will be pleased by this new entry into the Star Trek series, because Star Trek Beyond not only feels like a successful extended episode but the acting, story, characters, action, effects and so much more go towards creating a fun, crowd pleasing sci-fi adventure.

**** <-- Four Stars