Star Trek au-delà

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.

With two great movies under it's belt, the latest installment in the Star Trek reboot has some big boots to fill. I was skeptic when I heart J.J. Abrams was not directing it and the writing was done by Simon Pegg and Doug Jong. Fortunately, it turned out to be a solid trek film.

Star Trek Beyond begins with the Enterprise and it's crew on a five year research mission in uncharted space which was assigned to them at the end of the previous movie. Kirk is struggling staying focused as captain of a starship and he is doubting himself if this is the life he wants to live. The Enterprise takes a break from exploring in a massive star base called Yorktown. The star base receives a distress call from an alien woman who lost it's crew on a distant planet. Of course the Enterprise is the best ship to help the alien woman and search for the crew. But this search and rescue mission turns very ugly when they encounter one of the most ruthless villains who's hatred of the Federation puts the whole enterprise crew to the test.

I think they did a marvelous job again and made a Star Trek movie just as great as the previous two installments. The villain was not as interesting as Kahn but the movie makes up for it by focusing on the characters. The story lays more focus on new development like the bond that grows between Bones and Spock and the new female alien character Jaylah (Sofia Boutella, who did a marvelous job) which Scotty encounters. The third act of the movie is the best (with an excellent soundtrack, Beastie Boys and Star Trek mixes very well!) and they once again pull out all the stops with visual and sound effects.

The only caveat I have with this film is the slow start and the main plot being a bit simplistic. Sometimes it feels just like a regular Star Trek episode, but then again that is also one of it's strengths.

So definitely check this one out if you liked the previous two Star Trek films, it's a solid and very entertaining journey.

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.

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

After the noisy and irretrievably stupid (though reasonably entertaining) Into Darkness, I wasn't desperate to watch this one, but when I finally did I was relieved to discover that it was even more enjoyable than the first film in the reboot, a rollicking adventure with terrific alien weapons, fun McCoy/Spock repartee, a promising newcomer alien, and a lot of really excellent action scenes.

The movie had almost all the qualities of the original series except one - the thinking part. The smartest thing in the movie is the funny opening scene, which suggests the difficulty of communication between different cultures.

But that's the last thing in the movie that suggests even a moment of thought. The main villain has very little in the way of motivation, and when he explains his purpose it's quite disappointing. Nothing in this movie is there to provoke thought, and I'm not entirely convinced that anything in the movie really makes sense, although there's nothing at the time that hit me as too absurd to live with (unlike the previous movie).

If you expect this movie, like the series, to explore racism and war culture, well, you're not going to be happy. But if you just want some old-fashioned action with some familiar characters, this totally hits the spot.