I have to hand it to Paramount. After thoroughly and irreparably blowing Star Trek: The Next Generation's chance to have a movie franchise in, they wisely chose to go back to the well of what made Star Trek so great in the first place, the adventures of Captain James T. Kirk and the crew of the Enterprise on her five-year-mission. However, if they aren't careful, it's still possible to totally blow this chance to keep a good franchise going.
So, we pick up with Captain Kirk (Chris Pine) and the U.S.S. Enterprise beginning her five-year-mission of exploration. Actually, we're in the middle of that exploratory mission, when the Enterprise gets sent on a rescue to help a crashed vessel in a nebula. Of course, in true Star Trek fashion, they seem to be the only ship in the quadrant (Really? Quadrant implies four. Are we to believe the Federation has no more than four vessels?) that can handle the crisis. They go in, and are immediately attacked by a really bad guy which causes Kirk to crash the ship (Yes, again. For those of you keeping score, this is now the third time the Enterprise has been destroyed. But since the other two crashes happened in a parallel future which has been wiped out of existence, technically, they never happened. Are you with me so far?) on a remote planet. Then there is a whole plot about a lost Federation starship captained by a man who now hates...oh, does it really matter? It's Star Trek!
The Star Trek new (old?) cast is finally coming into its own. This movie has finally allowed the new cast to truly take the reins from Shatner & company and spread their wings on their own. The first movie had to introduce us to the new cast. The second had to finally kill the necessary nods to nostalgia so this third movie can finally be truly owned and inhabited by the new cast. Truth be told, the criticism of this being an excellent TV episode and a not-so-great movie is absolutely on the money, but that really doesn't matter. The writers have hit upon why the original crew made such good movies and The Next Gen cast didn't. It has nothing to do with one cast being better than the other, but rather story structure. The original Trek is really about Kirk, Spock and McCoy and their evolving relationship with each other. Everybody else is secondary, no matter what Takei, Nichols, Doohan or Koenig think, Shatner is correct that the big three are the stars. This is an ideal amount of deep characterization for movies as you only get 2+ hours every 3-4 years to see these characters. A cast as diverse as The Next Gen was always better suited for TV. Seven principle characters over seven years gives you ample opportunity to explore and get to know each character in detail. Now that we completely know and love them, each character not given adequate screen time will be cheated.
Star Trek Beyond has finally began exploring the big trio's new, evolving relationship, and I loved it. We are beginning to see the forging of what will be a lifetime friendship. Frankly, I don't care about Uhura's love story or capability, Sulu's gayness or Scotty's emotional depth. While the movie does a fairly good job of addressing everyone, it becomes perilously close to losing its focus. This time, the story worked well. A lesser writer could still botch it up in the future. If the series is going to remain viable and not be a convoluted mess like The Next Gen movies were, it needs to stick to the Kirk/Spock/McCoy formula. The only Next Gen movie that actually worked, (First Contact) worked precisely because they stuck to this formula. In fact, it only focused on Picard and Data. Everyone else was given good, but supporting performances in service to the larger story.
So, all in all, it was a fun, but rather limited story. The final reveal of the bad guy and his intentions gets a little convoluted. But in the end, this is a very satisfying romp and makes me want to see more.
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