Sorry - my rebuttal of the learned gentleman above must be hidden.
So there.Interestingly, the first point there that you list as a flaw I saw as a bonus. The rehash was a necessary hark back to an original storyline that a HUGE number of fans wanted to see, and rather than "rehash" the original storyline they made it COMPLETELY different! Other than the initial setup for that character's presence, the discovery and presence of that character and his crew were handled completely differently, and provide a HUGE contrast between the way the original universe Kirk handled the situation and how another, more militaristic mind handled it.
And I disagree with the lack of empathy and pathos - especially where Spock DIRECTLY mind-melded with Pike as he died and experienced that death - the conversation with Uhura about that showed that Spock's emotions are really writhing like snakes inside him since the death of his world and his mum and that he's ready to explode. The interesting setup for the future is that Spock has had an emotional rollercoaster much earlier in his life than Spock Prime, and hasn't had time to fully learn to control his feelings - which has been a common thread through both films in a subtle way.
The "rehashed" "saved the ship" scene was full of the same feelings and emotions as the original and garnered the same reaction from me with that added frisson of it being the other way round. Well written, well executed and different enough to be fascinating, to coin a phrase.
I shall conceal my rebuttal of my learned friend's rebuttal below
I disagree about the rehash being completely different. It's started off very well, with the illusion that Khan wasn't Khan but some guy from section 31 (I did like that reference). But once we found out about Khan, it broke down to pretty much Star Trek II all over again.
The one moment of the film that could have meant something - Kirk's death, was totally ruined by the wrath of "KHaaaannnnnn!" courtesy of Spock, honestly - I wonder how many takes it took Quinto to do that without laughing? It was horribly trite. Added to that, anyone with half a brain had already figured that Khan's blood would magically resurrect Kirk, so there was absolutely no suspense.
I remember sitting in the cinema watching Wrath of Khan, and being totally distraught at Spock's death, it still get's me now, it was undoubtedly Shatner and Nimoy's finest piece of Trek acting. The rehash left me cold. Honestly I cared more about Pike's death (which was in the first 45 minutes when the film still had promise) than I did about anything later.
McCoy was reduced to whinging one liners and analogies (which was even parodied by Kirk when he asked him to stop doing it).
Sulu had one decent line in the whole film - when he told Khan to surrender or be obliterated.
Poor old Chekov spent 90% of the film exiled off screen in Engineering.
Even Pine and Quinto, who opened so promisingly, by the end I felt it hard to believe these two guys really cared about each other. I know that they were "acting" like they cared, but the chemistry was lacking.
Saldana was the only one who I felt actually came out up from this venture, possibly because Nichols seldom got to play Uhura as anything other than talking head or comedy side kick.
- Khan - I want revenge. This time it's the Federation in general, last time it was Kirk
- Kirk - I'm going to outwit you cos you're 2 centuries out-of-date. last time that made sense - Khan was 2 centuries out-of-date and didn't have experience of tactical combat in space, this time it made no sense at all, Khan was the guy who had helped the federation (albeit under duress) to forge their super-advanced combat starships so the Feds could stick it to the Klingons. Old super brain Khan should have kicked Kirk's ****.
- The final (significant) conflict - Kirk and Khan in knackered spacecraft, Kirk pulls the wool over Khan's eyes and seriously wrecks his ship. Enterprise has a dodgy warpcore and everyone is going to die.
- Kirk/Spock switcheroo - So Kirk does the Spock thing and Spock does the Kirk thing and Scotty/Bones do pretty much the same thing both times).
The one moment of the film that could have meant something - Kirk's death, was totally ruined by the wrath of "KHaaaannnnnn!" courtesy of Spock, honestly - I wonder how many takes it took Quinto to do that without laughing? It was horribly trite. Added to that, anyone with half a brain had already figured that Khan's blood would magically resurrect Kirk, so there was absolutely no suspense.
I remember sitting in the cinema watching Wrath of Khan, and being totally distraught at Spock's death, it still get's me now, it was undoubtedly Shatner and Nimoy's finest piece of Trek acting. The rehash left me cold. Honestly I cared more about Pike's death (which was in the first 45 minutes when the film still had promise) than I did about anything later.
McCoy was reduced to whinging one liners and analogies (which was even parodied by Kirk when he asked him to stop doing it).
Sulu had one decent line in the whole film - when he told Khan to surrender or be obliterated.
Poor old Chekov spent 90% of the film exiled off screen in Engineering.
Even Pine and Quinto, who opened so promisingly, by the end I felt it hard to believe these two guys really cared about each other. I know that they were "acting" like they cared, but the chemistry was lacking.
Saldana was the only one who I felt actually came out up from this venture, possibly because Nichols seldom got to play Uhura as anything other than talking head or comedy side kick.
