nebulae wrote:I don't think it was meant to be epic. It was meant to be a fresh start, and with that in mind, it was about 80% character development and 20% plot. Compare that with the epic standard, Wrath of Khan, which was about 50% character-driven and 50% epic. But by then, you had 23 years to develop the characters that everyone already loved.
In this case, you needed an alternate reality to do a solid reboot. Going back to fix it wouldn't achieve that. You had to basically reintroduce 7-10 beloved characters in a new way, while remaining faithful to the originals. I think it succeeded very very well. Lots and lots of in-jokes (red-shirt getting offed in a horribly funny way, Sulu's fencing, Kirk ALWAYS losing his phaser, Spock's nerve grip, the miniskirts, Kirk chasing every miniskirt around, the crew already annoyed with Kirk's obnoxiously cocky behavior...right down to the way Kirk crosses his legs at the very end on the captain's chair) - You gotto admit, there was a ton of stuff in there that was true to old Trek. But now, with a breath of fresh air, the story can take off to a whole new level. I have no doubt the next movie will be tons better, just like X-Men2 was way WAY better than X-Men. Or Superman2. Or Spiderman2. Etc.
As for the holes in the storyline and the time travel, if you saw the credits, you'll see that about 90% of the mind-fuckers who work on Lost worked on this new movie. So the creative/insane/lazy time-travel crap is basically what these idiots eat for breakfast. They're simply regurgitating it for the sake of a story that needed to re-introduce the characters.
A fresh start could have been EPIC.
Yeah, I'll agree that Abrahms & Co have a health respect for the source material. I think you could have had all that fun and familiar stuff AND have a great time travel story. Or, no time travel story at all, actually. A large part of the early careers of the crew aren't known. Just the basics. You could have had an awesome story that brought all these people together prior to the events of TOS without fucking with the timeline at all. Even had them serving aboard their respective ships; which are then brought together in one part of the Galaxy to deal with some crisis. Even give them a scene in which they are all aboard the Enterprise because most of her crew is dead - Pike incapacitated. A fun 'glimpse' of things to come. Whatever. There EASILY could have been a way. Time travel is all too often used as a convenient plot device.
Disagree about Lost, though. The time travel story there is solid as hell and very clear. So far, anyway.
" when the lights turned on and kick was about to nail that green space ass.