All 3 films have the same plot: terrorist has grudge against the federation, commits a terrorist attack, enterprise gets messed up, bad guy reveals plan with super weapon, fist fight with bad guy at the end.
And within Star Trek itself, all three are lame rehashes of Wrath of Khan. All three villains are people who were screwed over and want revenge™️, *always* with a prototype superweapon.
Nero was bad too: "A natural disaster has destroyed my planet and then I time traveled 25 years in the past to a time when my planet was safe." "So, you'll warn our planet about its impending doom?" "No, I'm going to risk all of our lives by attacking Vulcan and Earth. Because they failed to save us from our sun going nova." "Ummm....you realize that, even if you succeed, Romulus is still fucked, right?"
Thank you! I always wondered about that and I realize that there's a deleted scene with the capture by the Klingons, but that's a deleted scene, and it's not in the movie. So basically Nero and the Narada are just sailing around for 25 years and do nothing?! Yeah, if that's the best they can do I wished it'd have ended back then too.
Actually it's worse than that. The Romulan sun sploded after the TNG-VOY era and the time travel bit took Spock from that point in time way back to the birth if Kirk! He could have given Romulus nearly 2 centuries of warning!
I believe this isn't actually a plot hole though; as he explains it, Romulus exploding was of course his triggering point, but he blamed it all on the Federation. In his eyes, if Romulus hadn't grown "dependant" on the Federation they wouldn't have died, but likely either have fixed it themselves or evactuated. To him, the Federation is the whole reason why it was able to happen in the first place. I believe he also might have believed that it was intentional, and just incompetence. "Spock didn't help us, he betrayed us." Either way, he's still a genocidal maniac due to his grief and rage, but at least not for a plot hole-y reason. Full quote for context: "My purpose, Christopher, is to not simply avoid the destruction of the home that I love, but to create a Romulus that exists free of the Federation. As only then will she be truly saved. That is why I will destroy all the remaining Federation planets, starting with yours."
When the film started with Spock unironically explaining that he can stop the volcano from erupting by using "cold fusion", I knew immediately that this was no longer Star Trek.
This. A hundred times, this. When I first watched it, I honestly didn't catch it. It was too stupid for my brain to even register anything. I can remember seeing a review of it where that was mentioned and I thought they were joking! They played the clip. I had to go back and see it for myself again. I just could not believe it. The biggest travesty is that they try to associate any of this with Star Trek.
With Abrams, Kurtzman, and Lindelof writing; I don't know why I expected better. And why in Hell are they paid so much, when they're too incompetent to Google a phrase they don't understand?
Why? Seriously, I don't get why that's the deciding factor you're going with. I think the crew of the Enterprise trying to save an entire civilization from disaster is in-keeping with their characters. Heck, I remember an episode of the OG series when - after being contracted by a mining company to _kill_ a dangerous alien creature, they instead have Spock mind-meld with the creature, decide that it is just an innocent animal defending it's territory, and work to find a way to preserve it's life, and find a way for the miners to co-exist with the thing. What I'm saying is, the Enterprise crew usually goes out of their way to save _everyone,_ be it human or alien.
Apparently in JJ Trek, Khan is as commonly remembered as Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldren and Zephram Cochran. In the original Space Seed that was a bit muddled as they seem oblivious in Act1, but by the awkward dinner party in Act 2 Scotty and Bones know a about him. The best explanation is waking up a guy named Patel and finding out Ohhhhh THAT PATEL.
@@deltafire5058 the President of the pasty white Englishman club, cast to play the Sikh, Noonyan Khan was worse than black Cleopatra. He was just auditioning for his Doctor Strange role the whole film.
And with that, "May name...is...KHAN!" remark, Ricardo Montalban's Khan beams over and beats the dog snot out of Benedict Cumberbatch's Khan on account of embarrassment by association.
- Alright his name is Carl. Write it down! - Not Carl! It's KHAN!!! - K what? - KHAN!!! - Khan? - KHAN!!! - Okay so it "k" and "a" or "h"... how do you pronounce it? - k, h, a, n. KHAN!!! - Khan that's it, aaand this is your family name? Yes? Yes. We kinda need your name to the report soo...
I hated the trope that the later Star Trek movies like this one and Nemesis fell into of "Bad guy has a ship thats so much bigger and better than the Enterprise!" one of the best things about the original Wrath of Khan was that the Enterprise and Reliant were closely matched so it was a battle of wits and skill not just who had the biggest guns. Also it makes no sense in universe that Star Fleet can just build a ship in secret thats like 3 x more powerful than whats meant to be their best ship. Star Fleet and the Federation in the original series and TNG era felt real and somewhat grounded - all thrown away in the reboot movies and Discovery Trek era.
Especially as it's right there in the Admirals office! I mean the model ship is just sitting there and the Admiral just looks at the Vengeance and Kirk and Spock just seem to blow it off and not wonder what that new model ship is?
Oh gods, interstellar transporters. And worse than that, a portable one you can pack in a suitcase. It was bad enough Scotty inventing transwarp beaming in the first JJDrek movie. I mean with that technology why would you even need a starfleet. Want to attack someone? Just beam the warheads directly to their planet. Makes a mockery of Voyager. With that tech they would have been home in a couple of weeks. Months at the most.
Into Derpness featuring Dr No-onien was peak lens flare by Jar Jar Abrams. At least until he made the Cinematic abortion that was 'The Rise of Palpatine'.
I recently watched Wrath of Khan for the first time since I was a kid, and while it still isn't my favorite TOS film it is miles better than this. The iconic scene of Kirk screaming "KHAN!" makes sense in that context because he's talking to him over comms. He's literally shouting angrily at a man who seemingly just defeated him. Secondly, Spock's death is treated with weight and drama, Kirk looks utterly helpless and broken as he is watching his best friend die, and just kind of slumps to the floor beside him in stunned silence. Into Darkness treats it like a cartoon, like what a child _thinks_ a dramatic death scene should look like, followed by ridiculous screaming at someone who isn't even there to hear it.
There is an argument to be made that Kirk shouting "Khan" is Kirk overacting as ruse to fool Khan that he is broken, as afterwards it is revealed that Kirk is completely unworried about being trapped in the Regula asteroid as he and Spock have a plan with their "hours become days" cipher.
Spock's Death in Wrath of Khan is a cinematic touchstone. It was legendary as soon as the first audiences saw it. It had the most gravitas of anything in the entire franchise up to that point (and still may be the defining moment of the IP).
The silly fight on the Klingon homeworld reminded me of the lover's spat between Spock and Uhura which Uhura ddcides to have during the mission, in front of the captain, as if this were a sitcom. One of the things about watching TOS is the professionalism displayed by the crew while on duty. Uhura could do things like tease Spock in the recreation room while on downtime, but she would not do so on the bridge in a crisis.
Imagine how brilliant Jar Jar Abrams thought he was for having Captain Kirk deleted instead of Spock... He must have picked up his Bud Light and sipped it down while hearing the song playing in his head... "REAL MAN OF GENIUS!!!"
Admiral Robocop: “can you build me a more advanced starship?” Smaug Khan: “naturally, my intellect has no limitations” Admiral Robocop: “perfect, this will be the dawn of a new age…” Smaug Khan: “just one question” Amiral Robocop: “and that is?” Smaug Khan: “what is a Starship?”
Kahn: my starship will go warp....2! I know they haven't invented warp drive yet but I'm so smart that I can give you warp 2. Admiral: bro, we're doing warp 9 now
There was this Board Game in the early 90's called Grape Escape. It was like Mousetrap with obstacles and traps, except the Grape characters were molded by you because they were made of clay. That way they could get squished and beaten and nothing would really happen since you could just remold them and make more. That's how the characters feel when you're watching a JJ Star Trek movie.
I have literally never heard anyone ever say Into darkness was the best of the rebooted movies. I've heard the third one is actually okay but it wasn't made by JJ abrams, and the first one is considered a kind of guilty pleasure, but into Darkness has been basically reviled by everyone I've ever spoken to about it.
Never cared about any of these Kelvin Star Treks. The 2009 movie is a very nauseating shaky camera garbage fest. Just utterly forgettable every one of them. Even Valerian was a more entertaining garbage than any of them.
8:16 I cried at this scene when the real Spock died. I felt nothing when fake Kirk "died". Those people don't know how emotions work because they are robots themselves. ffs, JarJar's company is named "Bad Robot". How on the nose can you get!?
I've always been so confused as to why "Into Darkness" Khan bears no resemblance to actual Khan. The Botany Bay crew went into stasis well before the Kelvin timeline split, so there should be no difference in how they dress, talk, etc. I could deal with a Khan recasting, but they made zero attempts to make it fit. It's bizzare... I've always thought such an easy fix could have been to have Cumberbatch play a different superman that we'd never met before. An enhanced engineer from WW3, and Khan himself remains in stasis as the twist. Even the movie's title is a meaningless jumble of words. What a waste.
Exactly. Have him play the #2 lieutenant. As bad as this guy is shown to be in the film, elude that there is a greater threat still waiting to wake up.
Adding to Dave's comment about McCoy being able to use Khan's blood to cure death, it's amazing how much Abrams casually dismantles the carefully built-up Trek universe just to make his plots work. "Sir, interstellar beaming is a thing now!" "OK, start mothballing Star Fleet, we don't need it anymore!"
why build start ship if you got interstellar beaming ... Honestly. problem with a race beam a bomb into the capital., shipyards, anywhere that allow beaming which is nearly 100% of star trek as no place keep shield on 24/7.
One simple fix that would have the Khan's arc and plot making much more sense: they woke Khan up for his military strategic genius. That would make sense. Would a modern general want to talk to Sun Tzu? Or Napoleon? Probably. Tech changes, but the as Sun Tzu's writings prove, military strategies at their core remain timeless. Of course, then the writers would actually have the burden of writing him as a strategic genius, which given the writing quality would have probably been insurmountable. However, the plot was terrible anyways, so it does not fix the overall problems.
That makes sense, if no starfleet officer has ever had even the most basic combat training. Or there aren't libraries full of books on the subject of military tactics. The whole plot is utter b.s.
Yes, exactly, they claim Admiral Marcus needed Khan to design weapons, but plenty of the most destructive weapons weren't designed by warriors. Oppenheimer wasn't a warrior, and he made the nuclear bomb. Khan being used to orchestrate plans to fight the Klingons, maybe using his own super-men, would have also provided Khan an opportunity to cooperate as it would allow him to take the whole Federation after secretly using it as his own strike force.
@@chrisbaker8533 Having books doesn't mean you understand the concepts, or can implement them effectively. There's a book series called _The Lost Fleet,_ about a 100-year long space war. Over time, so many officers have died that tactics have degenerated into headlong charges, while strategy is "whatever lets us kill enemy ships and populations". Both sides have access to tactical and strategic guides, but they don't _understand_ them. As the series goes on, the enemy tries to implement old tactics, but have no officers trained to control multiple formations in four dimensions, so they can't properly pull them off. They also don't know why the tactics are the way they are, so they do things like "If X is good, then doing even more X must be better", not realising how that could go wrong. Basically, Khan knows how to fight a war, and he's intelligent and adaptable enough to change his way of fighting to use newer weapons. Starfleet had lost the institutional knowledge.
I was fully expecting him to be one of Khan's followers, setting the stage for Khan in a later movie by showing how capable just one of his supermen were first. I guess this obvious setup was STILL too smart for the knuckle-dragging JJ.
You described the plot of Demolition Man! 😂 I remember watching all 3 of these movies. After being distracted by the visuals, you're left feeling empty as it's not really Star Trek. It's like a Fast & Furious version of Star Trek 😕
In Demolition Man bringing back old brutes actually makes sense as society has been neutered and pacified to the point where no one is capable of violence or rebellion. Jar Jar Treks are far more stupider films than Demolition Man that is now a cult classic, if not a legit classic movie. Mostly due to development of actual society mirroring it. Now enjoy owning nothing and eating bu... Taco Bell.
The reversal of the Spock death from Wrath of Khan and Kirk’s subsequent super recovery just made me groan inside. Conscious subverting of the brilliance of what had come before. The needs of the few, or the one, outweighing the needs of the many 🤷♂️ Thing is, I cared about Spock and Kirk in the Wrath of Khan, I didn’t give two hoots about these imposters.
No, as Star Trek III and IV made clear, Spock was wrong; the rights of the one DO outweigh the needs of the many. What kind of f-cking world do you want to live in, communist China or North Korea, where the needs of the many outweigh the rights of the one... or the Anglosphere, where the rights of the one outweigh the needs of the many? The needs of the many outweighs the needs of the few or the one has been used throughout history to justify the most horrific violations of humanity.
@@joshualandry3160 Even people who are NOW quite negative towards what JJ did were very positive after seeing those first movies. I was most surprised how highly people rated the Force Awakens.
They had to wake Khan up to help infuse a little violence for the same reason they woke John Spartan. Check the Enterprise heads for 3 seashells. Adding Demolition Man type humor would have made In To Darkness a much better movie because it was too hard to take seriously
As Dave mentions towards the end, all the flashy action scenes, and fast pace really does hide a bad movie. It is standard operating procedure for a Jar Jar Abrams film. A slow burn like Hunt for Red October could not be made today unfortunately.
Can you imagine a TOS or TNG movie made around the plot of Red October? Like, I think it was called "Balance of Terror" episode of TOS, which was based on the WWII movie, "The Enemy Below". I can see that being an amazing ST movie.
Transwarp Beaming killed Star Trek, as did the many other things they did to make space seem so incredibly small. Star Wars has the same issue since the sequels.
I let it slide in the first movie because it kind of aligned with the TNG episode _The Wounded_. But if they have the ability to beam something 112 light years away then why do they need anything else? Just transport a bunch of photon torpedoes into the major Klingon military or government structures and be done with it.
Discovery killed it further by introducing instant travel. No longer is there any need to actually travel anywhere. Just fire up your space bear drive and, seconds later, you can be on the other side of the universe.
Star Wars had that problem on Day One. Start at the back-end of galactic nowhere, jump in a ship, and be at the #2 most prosperous and important planet before you need to shave again? And they have real-time hyperspace comms, too. I've always wondered how the Outer Rim stays so Wild West-like, when business and politics can be done galaxy-wide faster than it could be done in the US in the 1950's.
I had to verify what you said about Krull. They just don't know how to leave well enough alone. The Glaive was just one of my favorite weapons. Jar Jar can only ruin a classic... again. smh
@@DaNinja60 No I haven't, I was never really that interested in Star Trek, and especially the older ones just didn't aged well from my perspective. But I can really see how older fans of the series can feel insulted by those movies. Especially second one...
@@Furebel Just watch the original movies from Star Trek: The Motion Picture. You'll see the magic the new ones lost including the revelation of Khan (from Space Seed) up to their final retirement. It's an epic adventure that many of us grew up with.
Thanks a lot Dave, great video. I love the way you - and the Critical Drinker - continue to point out just how far modern culture and society have fallen. The original 'The Wrath of Khan' and 'The Voyage Home' would be my fave movies with the old cast.
I remember hearing an interview on the Empire podcast in 2013 with the writers, and they were bragging about how Marcus was their version of GW Bush, and they were basically telling a story about WMD in Iraq, but in space. So it's *even dumber* than just a poor retelling of Wrath of Khan.
In the original “Wrath of Khan” film, Khan entrapped Kirk and a few crew in that planet as “a tomb”. That famous scene when Kirk desperately and angrily screams, “Khaaaaaan!!!” (as Khan’s ship slowly drifts triumphantly from the planet), my jaw dropped in shock! “The Khan won and Kirk will die!”, I thought to myself. Now that is superb script writing, plot twist, and heightened fear of a villain! (At that moment, Khan scared the hell out of me like Darth Vader did in “Empire Strikes Back”.) When, Kirk and crew found a way to survive and re-establish communication, that was an against-the-odds scenario. (Wow, that’s amazing storytelling, script writing, and world-class acting!) And then, Spock’s ultimate sacrifice…!!! Absolutely, brilliant and memorable classic film😎👍🏾 Sorry, JJ, your version was just a high-octane, high fructose corn syrup nothing burger that elevated my blood sugar and numbed my brain cells!😝 Thanks Dave Cullen for your critique and reflection on this “Jar Jar” Abrams film-its unbelievable that he gets entrusted with these mainstay and generational franchises (Star Trek and Star Wars), and makes them hollow not hallow, all-carbs with no protein, and microwaves not bakes them.😕
Hilariously, Kirk knew that the Enterprise would be repaired in mere hours. The iconic scream isn't one of a beaten man, just Shatner committing really hard to a bit 😂
The Abrams Star Trek is lacking in so many ways... for one, if Kirk nearly destroyed the Enterprise after every movie... do you know how many crew members would have died? There is a lack of honor for the ship too. Remember seeing the Enterprise in space dock and being so amazed by it, then seeing Kirks reaction... the music. The ship became a character in the movie and something you cared about. Now its just a plot device that you can blow up and rebuild with no consequences.
Explaining a computers to someone from 1723: "So you see the lighting up there? We learned how to make it, control it, and use it. So we make some lightning and we add a bunch of math and put the mixture into a box. From there we have a tool that has more knowledge in it than the whole of the Library of Alexandria. We largely use it to argue with people and look at pictures of naked people."
Funny how the Klingon homeworld is so very unprotected from infiltrators. I guess Starfleet isn't alone in that stupid policy of leaving Earth unprotected.
I don't understand how Kirk was given the captain's chair after several months in the academy. Since this is a new timeline, it would have been really interesting to see the roles reversed where Kirk becomes the first officer and Spock is the captain. But i do think they couldve made Spocks temper tantrum at the end work... if the audience was involved and IF they suggested that he couldnt control himself, even after he got back to the ship. It would be an incite into the mind of a Vulcan. We would finally be able to see how wild and dangerous they really are without logic
When I saw it in the theaters, initially I enjoyed it for what it was. But just like the force awakens, into the darkness has not aged well. In fact, the older gets the more glare in the parent. The films plot holes and flaws are glaringly obvious.
You are absolutely correct. The cherry on the cake was that awful shoehorning in of Leonard Nimoy for that poorly scripted scene in which he warns them about Khan, Utter nonsense. I like to pretend this trilogy of films never existed.
Khan being 300 years from the past but capable to build weapons and ships in the current time reminds me of Howard Stark telling Tony how he was limited by the technology of his time. That's my only way to argue how it can work here.
All three films were dumb. Dumbed down versions of Star Trek. Sulu holding a baby with his spouse, Kirk on a motorcycle with rock music, Spock kissing Uhura.... it's all like a bad dream. No real soul or logic.
I should think if you went back 300 years and asked someone's advice on wifi it'd be a hell of a lot better than asking Jar Jar how to make a good movie.
Near the start of the movie there's a scene after the archives get bombed when all the senior staff are assembled. Kirk asks why anyone would blow up an archive, then realizes that in the event of a terrorist attack all the most important leaders would be gathered in that room. Then Khan attacks that room. I thought it was a brilliant twist. Khan was maneuvering pieces on a chessboard. He hit a low security, unimportant target to compel the behavior of his adversaries and put them right where he wanted them to be so he could take them all out at once. Oh, but then it turns out the archives WERE actually a high value target because Section 31 was secretly operating out of them and Khan NEEDED to attack them... I really felt like they took too scripts and smashed them together without thinking about how they contradicted each other.
It's a trademark of JJ Abrams' style of writing these movies that the whole plot falls apart if he allows the audience even a second to think about what was just said by the characters Truly one of the filmmakers of all time
I must say, I audibly laughed/groaned/mockingly said "OK" in the theater when Kelvin Spick yelled out "Khaaaaaaaaan!" I try not to be rude, particularly in public, but it just came out.
There's the logical disconnect of being able to converse with Spock Prime on New Vulcan just minutes after Uhura said all comms were down, but then there's the inability to contact Starfleet after this exchange even though Enterprise is in visual range (much less the gravitatuonal pull) of Earth! The real kick in the teeth was Khan saying "All I have to do is target your life support system, _located behind the aft nacelle..."_ to know the writers thought their audience were complete idiots mesmerized by any polysyllabiac technobabble.
the moment khan killed the klingons... my response was. Oh, he's an augment. They had khan moving like the Augments did in Enterprise. Which had me wondering which augment he was, which batch, and if the torps were more of the augments
In the original Wrath of Khan, even then, he struggled to use the Reliant properly, since he didn’t know where the override was. That throws a wrench into the plot of Into Darkness right there.
Thanks for telling us about Star Trek Continues. I binged the whole 11 episodes in one sitting that very evening. THE best new Star Trek I've seen since 1969! (Yes... I saw TOS during its original run. Not much of the 3rd season, though, as they moved it into a time-slot that was past my childhood bedtime) Why couldn't Paramount have done something like CONTINUES in all these decades?
How would the torpedoes even work? 80% of the internal space is taken up by a cryogenic container, there is no room for fuel, explosives or control systems.
I haven't watched ST Into Darkness, so this is the first time I'm hearing about the torpedoes. However, I find it amusing that they didn't think about the implications of size. Mass matters... In a story I wrote, I have a scene with an AI battleship in for reload. He's paranoid for a good number of reasons, and he's thinking, that this is a good opportunity for saboteurs to board. After checking all the cam-footage of the usual and less-than-usual methods of slipping aboard, he considers the 16" ammo that is being loaded. He quickly brushes off the shells, as the saboteur would need to be as small as his commander in order to fit (she's notably less than 5 feet tall), so it's a non-starter. The propellant cans however, would not only provide enough room for a body, but also some supplies to wait a few days. Then he thinks that it's a moot point, because everything coming aboard is being weighed by his own equipment, and nothing weighs saboteur. For perspective, a shell weighs nearly a VW Beetle, and a propellant can holds three bags weighting 50kg each.
I never really felt much from watching those movies. I never put enough thought into it afterwards. Your analysis is spot-on and explains the reason why I never felt much from those.
What is with the obsession of Star Trek to turn augments into superheroes? In the Original Series and Deep Space Nine, they where just the peak of what humans can be. But starting with Enterprise, they could move like they where in the Matrix and in this movie, Khan can literally resurrect the dead.
I remember they are like the people in the movie Gattaca. Nothing special, just the best possible genes you could have, some people are lucky to have that, now we all can be lucky.
Impossible to say how much genetic engineering could boost Khan's value as a weapon designer. Imagine an ape that could build spears and train other apes to use pikes in a phalanx formation against other apes.
I must admit. I enjoyed it. Thing is i'm a massive Star Wars nerd, with very little knowledge of Star Trek. Super casual, at best. But as a Star Wars guy, I now feel your pain. I get it.
I remember thinking, why all the panic to catch Khan at the end for his blood, when they had all this crew is the missiles which all had the same magical blood... Oh yes, and the cured death from then on!
As a long term Bab5 fan, all throughout this movie, I was somehow waiting for a plot ‚twist‘ of some sort. Like they had Khan’s crewmen’s brains hard-wired to the torpedoes to give them superior agility or aiming and tracking. Maybe the writers even played with that idea and forgot about it along the way XD
Its because writers today have no idea how to write, random action, random shock value, and NSFW drama mixed together like a throw of the dice. Its to writing what the hologram at the end of "Virtuoso" (star trek voyager) was to music composition!
Marconi, Guglielmo Marconi... that's the guy you need travel back in time to meet to ask how to enhance your 21st century WiFi reception. I mean didn't he pretty much pioneered "wireless"?
It's too bad that Ed Wood was deceased when Abrams decided to attack Star Trek with a meat cleaver. Wood's films had generally better scripts so he should have been hired as a story consultant.
Most of the opinions I've heard have ranked Beyond as the best. I kinda tend to agree. The first two were packed with references, and there was a lot of effort put into making sure people noticed them. Beyond, on the other hand, in spite of everything else, at least focused more on the story, instead of trying to impress the audience with references. It had plenty wrong with it. They all had their flaws, but I at least felt like the story was original, and it placed before us, to accept or reject. The way I see it, one of JJ's problems is that he tends to be passive & doesn't stick up for his ideas. When describing Into Darkness, there were a few times, where he said that he had been over-ruled. It sounded like Into Darkness might have been less of a parallel to Trek II at one point. I laughed when Spock yelled Khan's name. It had no where near the weight of the scene from the original film, and it sounded ridiculous to me. I do like that JJ stuck up for fans, when it sounded like the studio was set on going after fan productions. In general, I found the movie series mostly harmless, compared to what they're doing with the property, now. Aside from Spock leaving the original universe, there was really no real impact on the classic stories, you could pretty much go back & add on to where Nemesis left off, if you wanted to ignore the Kelvin films. I didn't mind the films. I kinda liked the story that the first film had, as far as Pike being a mentor to Kirk. They're not strong films, though, and I wouldn't try to defend them to anyone that disagrees.
Yep. They had a great cast to remake the Gary Mitchell incident, and chose to do a butchered remake of Wrath. Just look at the scene with him in the force field brig and ...Kirk Spock and Alice Eve in her Sally Kellerman hairdo or wig.
I'm still not entirely sure why they needed Khan's blood in particular to save Kirk. I mean, they had 72 of Khan's people on ice, right there on the ship...
I’ve thought about this particular sequel a lot, being an absolute fan of the original. While they missed a ton of opportunities, one that just jumps out is having the crew stumble upon Khan with no knowledge of who or what he is and having young Spock talk to old Spock about who this is and what risk he poses to the galaxy. Would have been a sweet and interesting moment in the movie and like not having the original Star Wars characters back together in episode 7 is a major miss that can never be fixed. We truly live in an age of some really stupid film makers. Oh almost forgot, it’s the same stupid film maker.
While I detest this film, The one scene I did like was Khan dropping two platoons of Klingons like they were nothing, We have been told much of the Superior Intellect. However the superior strength was only shown when moving battle damage debris on the USS Reliant bridge. We saw a bit of the Augment combat prowess in Enterprise, so I thought it was a nice add. I know it was an action segment solely to keep your attention and in the writes mind 'move the plot' forward but I still liked it for the reason stated. Excellent work as always Dave, see you next time.
My only memory from this film was walking out of the cinema thinking: "I didn't understand the plot of this movie". Now finally someone explained it to me, tnx :D
Great video! I liked the 2009 movie enough to watch it more than once. I watched Into Darkness. I know I did. I remember none of it and even some of the plot points you had here aren't sounding familiar to me. That's how gawdawful it was. And Benedict Cumberbatch is a great actor so I can't/shan't blame him. I have seen nothing past Into -Idiocy- Darkness and I don't miss it in the slightest.
... another example of terribleness is the prisoner exchange. now the movie was a while back, thats why i had to read a synopsis to get some of my memory back but here it goes: cumberbatch has the captain hostage and spock exchanges him for something that cumberbatch wants. cumberbatch than announces to destroy the enterprise which he was capable of. at that very moment spock should have said that he tricked khan and the thing that khan wanted in the exchange was still on board and thus preventing the destruction of the enterprise. this would have sparked another round of negotiations and which spock would have had the upper hand. vulcans are supposedly smart...
I remember being so bothered by the idea in this film that Khan's blood could cure death and how, since they have this technology figured out, no one would ever die again... and then it's all but forgotten by the next film. If they wanted a gimmick to bring Kirk back, I wish they had just thought of something, anything, that wouldn't lend itself to future replication, like some technology Khan had that was used on Kirk but in the course of the film was destroyed. But whatever, the film was just a complete mess.
If Khan's blood worked like that, none of his people would've even aged in Star Trek 2. All that Khan was supposed to be is genetically advanced - along the lines of Captain America - a physically perfect human being, not some kind of god with healing blood.
One of the stupidest things you actually missed: So, they're at Warp, trying to get to Earth - Smart, because if the Juggernaut or whatever follows them there, it'd expose the ship to everyone *and* have to fight a whole fleet. But, the Juggernaut is faster, the Enterprise gets intercepted - at high warp - only to find themselves..... IN EARTH'S GRAVITY
I didn’t hate that movie. My expectations were low for all of the reboot movies, so they were all a big “whatever” for me. Strictly fan fiction. And I fully expected the memberberries they gave us in the climax.
When I think about this movie I remember that it was the first time a studio outright lied and tried to deceive fans. The fans had sussed out that this was a Khan remake and were asking about it to producer, actors, even the director. And they all said no. I remember realizing that the producer were treating fans like they were stupid. And after watching the movie all doubt was gone.
Sorry I meant to say the film came out in 2013 and not 2012, my bad.
and 72 has nothing todo with the 72 virgins a muslim can expect after death?
No worries Dave, it's really Jar Jar's BAD !! 🤣
i liked the first star trek in JJ abrams universe but this one sucked all the ass so i didnt even watch the third one.
@@taravati181 You saved yourself 2 hours of life.
@@taravati181 The first JJ Trek movie was his Star Wars application/resume.
All 3 films have the same plot: terrorist has grudge against the federation, commits a terrorist attack, enterprise gets messed up, bad guy reveals plan with super weapon, fist fight with bad guy at the end.
And none the technical stuff, characters, or plot making any sense.
Almost like one big predictive programming psyop to get people against those who protest government. 🤔
And within Star Trek itself, all three are lame rehashes of Wrath of Khan. All three villains are people who were screwed over and want revenge™️, *always* with a prototype superweapon.
Stop being mean! It's the only plot device he knows!
Crazy, but true!
Nero was bad too: "A natural disaster has destroyed my planet and then I time traveled 25 years in the past to a time when my planet was safe."
"So, you'll warn our planet about its impending doom?"
"No, I'm going to risk all of our lives by attacking Vulcan and Earth. Because they failed to save us from our sun going nova."
"Ummm....you realize that, even if you succeed, Romulus is still fucked, right?"
Thank you! I always wondered about that and I realize that there's a deleted scene with the capture by the Klingons, but that's a deleted scene, and it's not in the movie. So basically Nero and the Narada are just sailing around for 25 years and do nothing?! Yeah, if that's the best they can do I wished it'd have ended back then too.
I really do hate that plot hole.
Actually it's worse than that. The Romulan sun sploded after the TNG-VOY era and the time travel bit took Spock from that point in time way back to the birth if Kirk! He could have given Romulus nearly 2 centuries of warning!
Was n;tr it more like 150 Years in the Past, than 25?
I believe this isn't actually a plot hole though; as he explains it, Romulus exploding was of course his triggering point, but he blamed it all on the Federation. In his eyes, if Romulus hadn't grown "dependant" on the Federation they wouldn't have died, but likely either have fixed it themselves or evactuated. To him, the Federation is the whole reason why it was able to happen in the first place. I believe he also might have believed that it was intentional, and just incompetence. "Spock didn't help us, he betrayed us."
Either way, he's still a genocidal maniac due to his grief and rage, but at least not for a plot hole-y reason. Full quote for context: "My purpose, Christopher, is to not simply avoid the destruction of the home that I love, but to create a Romulus that exists free of the Federation. As only then will she be truly saved. That is why I will destroy all the remaining Federation planets, starting with yours."
When the film started with Spock unironically explaining that he can stop the volcano from erupting by using "cold fusion", I knew immediately that this was no longer Star Trek.
😂 Star Trek used to try and be accurate at least (as much as they could)
This. A hundred times, this. When I first watched it, I honestly didn't catch it. It was too stupid for my brain to even register anything. I can remember seeing a review of it where that was mentioned and I thought they were joking! They played the clip. I had to go back and see it for myself again. I just could not believe it.
The biggest travesty is that they try to associate any of this with Star Trek.
With Abrams, Kurtzman, and Lindelof writing; I don't know why I expected better.
And why in Hell are they paid so much, when they're too incompetent to Google a phrase they don't understand?
Why? Seriously, I don't get why that's the deciding factor you're going with.
I think the crew of the Enterprise trying to save an entire civilization from disaster is in-keeping with their characters. Heck, I remember an episode of the OG series when - after being contracted by a mining company to _kill_ a dangerous alien creature, they instead have Spock mind-meld with the creature, decide that it is just an innocent animal defending it's territory, and work to find a way to preserve it's life, and find a way for the miners to co-exist with the thing.
What I'm saying is, the Enterprise crew usually goes out of their way to save _everyone,_ be it human or alien.
Ah, but it looked good.
Thats all that matters now
When he aggressively said "My name..... is... KHAN!!!", I almost expected Kirk to respond with: "Um....okay."
Apparently in JJ Trek, Khan is as commonly remembered as Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldren and Zephram Cochran. In the original Space Seed that was a bit muddled as they seem oblivious in Act1, but by the awkward dinner party in Act 2 Scotty and Bones know a about him.
The best explanation is waking up a guy named Patel and finding out Ohhhhh THAT PATEL.
And that thin smile he lets out. I think it was supposed to be menacing but it was laugh inducing.
@@deltafire5058 the President of the pasty white Englishman club, cast to play the Sikh, Noonyan Khan was worse than black Cleopatra.
He was just auditioning for his Doctor Strange role the whole film.
And with that, "May name...is...KHAN!" remark, Ricardo Montalban's Khan beams over and beats the dog snot out of Benedict Cumberbatch's Khan on account of embarrassment by association.
- Alright his name is Carl. Write it down!
- Not Carl! It's KHAN!!!
- K what?
- KHAN!!!
- Khan?
- KHAN!!!
- Okay so it "k" and "a" or "h"... how do you pronounce it?
- k, h, a, n. KHAN!!!
- Khan that's it, aaand this is your family name? Yes? Yes. We kinda need your name to the report soo...
Hollywood script writers no longer care about having a good story - they think that flashing lights and loud noises are everything.
don"t forget lens flares!
Sadly, it works because the average movie goer has the IQ of a dead fish
It is now.
Sorry to say, but take a look at the target generation of these films, and then consider the script writers' point of view.
Show me a kid in school these days who actually reads books. I don’t think students read books at all anymore.
I hated the trope that the later Star Trek movies like this one and Nemesis fell into of "Bad guy has a ship thats so much bigger and better than the Enterprise!" one of the best things about the original Wrath of Khan was that the Enterprise and Reliant were closely matched so it was a battle of wits and skill not just who had the biggest guns. Also it makes no sense in universe that Star Fleet can just build a ship in secret thats like 3 x more powerful than whats meant to be their best ship. Star Fleet and the Federation in the original series and TNG era felt real and somewhat grounded - all thrown away in the reboot movies and Discovery Trek era.
Agreed especially in Discovery where the ship warp drive works thanks to magic and not science
Good post!
Especially as it's right there in the Admirals office! I mean the model ship is just sitting there and the Admiral just looks at the Vengeance and Kirk and Spock just seem to blow it off and not wonder what that new model ship is?
Compared to Into Darkness, I think Nemesis is a masterclass of Star Trek storytelling
Nerd here actually Khan had a light Battle cruiser and Kirk the medium Battle Cruiser. So Khan was actually at a tactical disadvantage.
Magic blood that can heal everything, including death. Interstellar transporters.
wasn't even a complicated process.
oh god the magic blood. Did the entire Federation become immortal after this film?
@@Daimo83To be fair, Star Trek has a long history of discovering god-level technology and then just kind of putting in a broom closet.
Oh gods, interstellar transporters. And worse than that, a portable one you can pack in a suitcase. It was bad enough Scotty inventing transwarp beaming in the first JJDrek movie.
I mean with that technology why would you even need a starfleet. Want to attack someone? Just beam the warheads directly to their planet.
Makes a mockery of Voyager. With that tech they would have been home in a couple of weeks. Months at the most.
@@tonygreenfield7820Stop thinking so much. Just consume product and get excited for next product. 😂
Into Derpness featuring Dr No-onien was peak lens flare by Jar Jar Abrams. At least until he made the Cinematic abortion that was 'The Rise of Palpatine'.
Lens flare manufacturers had to discover a whole new level of shiny. On the bridge...ffs
Can't see how bad the movie is if you can't see!
How could anyone take JarJar Abrams seriously as a producer or director? He's like the Dark Helmet of film making.
I recently watched Wrath of Khan for the first time since I was a kid, and while it still isn't my favorite TOS film it is miles better than this. The iconic scene of Kirk screaming "KHAN!" makes sense in that context because he's talking to him over comms. He's literally shouting angrily at a man who seemingly just defeated him. Secondly, Spock's death is treated with weight and drama, Kirk looks utterly helpless and broken as he is watching his best friend die, and just kind of slumps to the floor beside him in stunned silence. Into Darkness treats it like a cartoon, like what a child _thinks_ a dramatic death scene should look like, followed by ridiculous screaming at someone who isn't even there to hear it.
There is an argument to be made that Kirk shouting "Khan" is Kirk overacting as ruse to fool Khan that he is broken, as afterwards it is revealed that Kirk is completely unworried about being trapped in the Regula asteroid as he and Spock have a plan with their "hours become days" cipher.
Into Darkness is a better Trek movie than Wrath of Khan. WroK saved and ruined Star Trek.
Spock's Death in Wrath of Khan is a cinematic touchstone. It was legendary as soon as the first audiences saw it. It had the most gravitas of anything in the entire franchise up to that point (and still may be the defining moment of the IP).
@@tomcruisenukedmyaccount5388 If you like pretty pictures and flashing lights.
@@tomcruisenukedmyaccount5388 That is one of he most insane statements I've ever read. 🤨
The silly fight on the Klingon homeworld reminded me of the lover's spat between Spock and Uhura which Uhura ddcides to have during the mission, in front of the captain, as if this were a sitcom. One of the things about watching TOS is the professionalism displayed by the crew while on duty. Uhura could do things like tease Spock in the recreation room while on downtime, but she would not do so on the bridge in a crisis.
When TOS was made, there was still some separation between public life and private life. Between personal life and professional life.
@@Hiraghm Also, the makers of TOS included people who'd served in the military.
You are so right.
Imagine how brilliant Jar Jar Abrams thought he was for having Captain Kirk deleted instead of Spock... He must have picked up his Bud Light and sipped it down while hearing the song playing in his head...
"REAL MAN OF GENIUS!!!"
He must have been doing his damnedest to not get the treatment that RLM gave the Star Wars prequels.
Abrams did not even do it right. He put the "Khan!" scream in the wrong part of the movie.
Today, we salute you, Mister "Better Movie Ripoff-Guy!"
@@SirBlackReedsRLM suggested JJ Abrams as a replacement for George for the future Star Wars films. Boy that aged like milk…
... read that back to yourself. and then ask yourself are you happy with the adult you have become.
Admiral Robocop: “can you build me a more advanced starship?”
Smaug Khan: “naturally, my intellect has no limitations”
Admiral Robocop: “perfect, this will be the dawn of a new age…”
Smaug Khan: “just one question”
Amiral Robocop: “and that is?”
Smaug Khan: “what is a Starship?”
Kahn: my starship will go warp....2! I know they haven't invented warp drive yet but I'm so smart that I can give you warp 2.
Admiral: bro, we're doing warp 9 now
So nobody got the clue that these are NOT Star Trek films by the time Beastie Boys were blasting at you in the first movie? Ok I guess.
I realized pretty early on the '09 movie was complete trash.
This isn't Star Trek. It's a parody.
The show has been parody for years.
I quite like The Orville because apart from the dodgy humour, it actually feels like Star Trek
@@marktyler3381the Orville is a respectful parody from someone who truly loved what he was parodying
@@augustlion5105 Agreed. My 17 year old kid loves TOS so much, he published a fan fiction compilation.
SNW IS the Parody... Into Darkness is just Shite!
Don't forget they hid a spaceship in the ocean for no reason!!! i cant imagine what that did to the impulse manifolds.
JJ Trek is nothing but "turn your brain off action" movies.
Don't think. Just consume product and get ready for next product.
The literal antithesis of Star Trek 🤦
he should make marvel movies
There was this Board Game in the early 90's called Grape Escape. It was like Mousetrap with obstacles and traps, except the Grape characters were molded by you because they were made of clay. That way they could get squished and beaten and nothing would really happen since you could just remold them and make more.
That's how the characters feel when you're watching a JJ Star Trek movie.
He's the master of the Mystery Box.
Sounds like Starfleet already replaced toilet paper with 3 sea shells!
and to this day no one knows how they work. Other than painfully l ol
Heh! Heh! Heh! Heh! He doesn’t know how the three seashells work! Heh! Heh! Heh!
After drinking all that Brawndo you need to use those 3 sea shells, too.
Yes, an intentional crossover of sci-fi stories.
“My God, Bones…what have I done?”
-JJ Abrams
I have literally never heard anyone ever say Into darkness was the best of the rebooted movies. I've heard the third one is actually okay but it wasn't made by JJ abrams, and the first one is considered a kind of guilty pleasure, but into Darkness has been basically reviled by everyone I've ever spoken to about it.
Agreed. Everyone I have ever spoken to agrees that the second one is complete dogshit, whereas the other two have some brainless entertainment value.
The 3rd one is even worse, the drinker summed it up very well as Star Trek: Beyond Stupidity. I'd love to hear Dave's thoughts on that one!
Beyond is fun.
Never cared about any of these Kelvin Star Treks. The 2009 movie is a very nauseating shaky camera garbage fest. Just utterly forgettable every one of them. Even Valerian was a more entertaining garbage than any of them.
You can find a guy in the comment section here who say it is the best movie.
So you literally never heard it but you heard it. :)
8:16 I cried at this scene when the real Spock died.
I felt nothing when fake Kirk "died".
Those people don't know how emotions work because they are robots themselves.
ffs, JarJar's company is named "Bad Robot". How on the nose can you get!?
I've always been so confused as to why "Into Darkness" Khan bears no resemblance to actual Khan. The Botany Bay crew went into stasis well before the Kelvin timeline split, so there should be no difference in how they dress, talk, etc. I could deal with a Khan recasting, but they made zero attempts to make it fit. It's bizzare... I've always thought such an easy fix could have been to have Cumberbatch play a different superman that we'd never met before. An enhanced engineer from WW3, and Khan himself remains in stasis as the twist. Even the movie's title is a meaningless jumble of words. What a waste.
Exactly. Have him play the #2 lieutenant. As bad as this guy is shown to be in the film, elude that there is a greater threat still waiting to wake up.
Quite right-Cumberbatch’s character could simply have been another genetically engineered human.
Adding to Dave's comment about McCoy being able to use Khan's blood to cure death, it's amazing how much Abrams casually dismantles the carefully built-up Trek universe just to make his plots work. "Sir, interstellar beaming is a thing now!" "OK, start mothballing Star Fleet, we don't need it anymore!"
why build start ship if you got interstellar beaming ... Honestly. problem with a race beam a bomb into the capital., shipyards, anywhere that allow beaming which is nearly 100% of star trek as no place keep shield on 24/7.
One simple fix that would have the Khan's arc and plot making much more sense: they woke Khan up for his military strategic genius. That would make sense. Would a modern general want to talk to Sun Tzu? Or Napoleon? Probably. Tech changes, but the as Sun Tzu's writings prove, military strategies at their core remain timeless. Of course, then the writers would actually have the burden of writing him as a strategic genius, which given the writing quality would have probably been insurmountable. However, the plot was terrible anyways, so it does not fix the overall problems.
That makes sense, if no starfleet officer has ever had even the most basic combat training.
Or there aren't libraries full of books on the subject of military tactics.
The whole plot is utter b.s.
That was my first thought when Dave was ranting about "what advice he could offer"
Yes, exactly, they claim Admiral Marcus needed Khan to design weapons, but plenty of the most destructive weapons weren't designed by warriors. Oppenheimer wasn't a warrior, and he made the nuclear bomb. Khan being used to orchestrate plans to fight the Klingons, maybe using his own super-men, would have also provided Khan an opportunity to cooperate as it would allow him to take the whole Federation after secretly using it as his own strike force.
@@chrisbaker8533 Having books doesn't mean you understand the concepts, or can implement them effectively.
There's a book series called _The Lost Fleet,_ about a 100-year long space war. Over time, so many officers have died that tactics have degenerated into headlong charges, while strategy is "whatever lets us kill enemy ships and populations". Both sides have access to tactical and strategic guides, but they don't _understand_ them. As the series goes on, the enemy tries to implement old tactics, but have no officers trained to control multiple formations in four dimensions, so they can't properly pull them off. They also don't know why the tactics are the way they are, so they do things like "If X is good, then doing even more X must be better", not realising how that could go wrong.
Basically, Khan knows how to fight a war, and he's intelligent and adaptable enough to change his way of fighting to use newer weapons. Starfleet had lost the institutional knowledge.
In the original show, Khan asked if he could looks at the ship's diagrams because he said he was once an engineer.
The movie would’ve been slightly (I say again: slightly) better if John Harrison had stayed John Harrison. The Khan reveal felt really tacked-on.
They could have made him one of the supermen following Khan into exile, and Khan is still In his hibernation pod.
I was fully expecting him to be one of Khan's followers, setting the stage for Khan in a later movie by showing how capable just one of his supermen were first. I guess this obvious setup was STILL too smart for the knuckle-dragging JJ.
Yep
actually, it would have been very cool if John Harrison was revealed to be Harrison Bergeron...
You are correct-having Harrison turn out to be Khan seemed so arbitrary.
You described the plot of Demolition Man! 😂
I remember watching all 3 of these movies. After being distracted by the visuals, you're left feeling empty as it's not really Star Trek. It's like a Fast & Furious version of Star Trek 😕
And the funny thing is Demolition Man is actually quite good.🥴
In Demolition Man bringing back old brutes actually makes sense as society has been neutered and pacified to the point where no one is capable of violence or rebellion. Jar Jar Treks are far more stupider films than Demolition Man that is now a cult classic, if not a legit classic movie. Mostly due to development of actual society mirroring it. Now enjoy owning nothing and eating bu... Taco Bell.
Yep@@qasimmir7117
The reversal of the Spock death from Wrath of Khan and Kirk’s subsequent super recovery just made me groan inside. Conscious subverting of the brilliance of what had come before. The needs of the few, or the one, outweighing the needs of the many 🤷♂️ Thing is, I cared about Spock and Kirk in the Wrath of Khan, I didn’t give two hoots about these imposters.
No, as Star Trek III and IV made clear, Spock was wrong; the rights of the one DO outweigh the needs of the many.
What kind of f-cking world do you want to live in, communist China or North Korea, where the needs of the many outweigh the rights of the one... or the Anglosphere, where the rights of the one outweigh the needs of the many?
The needs of the many outweighs the needs of the few or the one has been used throughout history to justify the most horrific violations of humanity.
Chill, it’s a movie that’s being discussed 😂🤷♂️👍
@Hiraghm The very definition of self-centered. According to you, you are worth more than everyone else combined.
It's amazing how many people JJ managed to fool with the first Star Trek and even more with the first Star Wars.
We live in an age of conjurors.
I wasn't fooled, I thought they were trash.
@whitmanmaleman Use your brain.
Well, to be fair we didn't really know what JJ was going to deliver the first time around.
@@joshualandry3160 Even people who are NOW quite negative towards what JJ did were very positive after seeing those first movies. I was most surprised how highly people rated the Force Awakens.
They had to wake Khan up to help infuse a little violence for the same reason they woke John Spartan.
Check the Enterprise heads for 3 seashells.
Adding Demolition Man type humor would have made In To Darkness a much better movie because it was too hard to take seriously
Haha I was thinking also it reminded alot of demolition man when I heard Mr Cullen retell it here. good call.
The whole kelvin timeline kinda ruined the beastie boys for me
As Dave mentions towards the end, all the flashy action scenes, and fast pace really does hide a bad movie. It is standard operating procedure for a Jar Jar Abrams film. A slow burn like Hunt for Red October could not be made today unfortunately.
People's attention span today is not enough to handle Red October
Trans ocean submarines... dear god man! What have you done! 😅☺️
Can you imagine a TOS or TNG movie made around the plot of Red October? Like, I think it was called "Balance of Terror" episode of TOS, which was based on the WWII movie, "The Enemy Below".
I can see that being an amazing ST movie.
I won't even give it that because it's flash is highly obnoxious. There is zero difference between this movie and a video game.
Transwarp Beaming killed Star Trek, as did the many other things they did to make space seem so incredibly small.
Star Wars has the same issue since the sequels.
I let it slide in the first movie because it kind of aligned with the TNG episode _The Wounded_.
But if they have the ability to beam something 112 light years away then why do they need anything else? Just transport a bunch of photon torpedoes into the major Klingon military or government structures and be done with it.
Discovery killed it further by introducing instant travel. No longer is there any need to actually travel anywhere. Just fire up your space bear drive and, seconds later, you can be on the other side of the universe.
@@Uzarran How is this aligned with The Wounded? I don't remember that epsiode too well?
Star Wars had that problem on Day One.
Start at the back-end of galactic nowhere, jump in a ship, and be at the #2 most prosperous and important planet before you need to shave again?
And they have real-time hyperspace comms, too. I've always wondered how the Outer Rim stays so Wild West-like, when business and politics can be done galaxy-wide faster than it could be done in the US in the 1950's.
@@stevenscott2136exactly
I just love how these terrible movies have done virtually nothing to bring in new young fans like they wanted. Bravo JJ! Keep your hands off of Krull!
I had to verify what you said about Krull. They just don't know how to leave well enough alone. The Glaive was just one of my favorite weapons. Jar Jar can only ruin a classic... again. smh
To be honest, I liked the first one, but it was my first Star Trek ever. The second was so bad I didn't even wanted to watch the third.
@@Furebel These are just cheap rehashes of the original voyages. Hope you've seen them. They are well worth it.
@@DaNinja60 No I haven't, I was never really that interested in Star Trek, and especially the older ones just didn't aged well from my perspective. But I can really see how older fans of the series can feel insulted by those movies. Especially second one...
@@Furebel Just watch the original movies from Star Trek: The Motion Picture. You'll see the magic the new ones lost including the revelation of Khan (from Space Seed) up to their final retirement. It's an epic adventure that many of us grew up with.
Thanks a lot Dave, great video. I love the way you - and the Critical Drinker - continue to point out just how far modern culture and society have fallen. The original 'The Wrath of Khan' and 'The Voyage Home' would be my fave movies with the old cast.
I remember hearing an interview on the Empire podcast in 2013 with the writers, and they were bragging about how Marcus was their version of GW Bush, and they were basically telling a story about WMD in Iraq, but in space.
So it's *even dumber* than just a poor retelling of Wrath of Khan.
In the original “Wrath of Khan” film, Khan entrapped Kirk and a few crew in that planet as “a tomb”. That famous scene when Kirk desperately and angrily screams, “Khaaaaaan!!!” (as Khan’s ship slowly drifts triumphantly from the planet), my jaw dropped in shock! “The Khan won and Kirk will die!”, I thought to myself. Now that is superb script writing, plot twist, and heightened fear of a villain! (At that moment, Khan scared the hell out of me like Darth Vader did in “Empire Strikes Back”.) When, Kirk and crew found a way to survive and re-establish communication, that was an against-the-odds scenario. (Wow, that’s amazing storytelling, script writing, and world-class acting!) And then, Spock’s ultimate sacrifice…!!! Absolutely, brilliant and memorable classic film😎👍🏾 Sorry, JJ, your version was just a high-octane, high fructose corn syrup nothing burger that elevated my blood sugar and numbed my brain cells!😝 Thanks Dave Cullen for your critique and reflection on this “Jar Jar” Abrams film-its unbelievable that he gets entrusted with these mainstay and generational franchises (Star Trek and Star Wars), and makes them hollow not hallow, all-carbs with no protein, and microwaves not bakes them.😕
Hilariously, Kirk knew that the Enterprise would be repaired in mere hours.
The iconic scream isn't one of a beaten man, just Shatner committing really hard to a bit 😂
I remember how confused I was when I watched this movie in the theatre. I couldn’t make sense of anything happening.
The Abrams Star Trek is lacking in so many ways... for one, if Kirk nearly destroyed the Enterprise after every movie... do you know how many crew members would have died? There is a lack of honor for the ship too. Remember seeing the Enterprise in space dock and being so amazed by it, then seeing Kirks reaction... the music. The ship became a character in the movie and something you cared about. Now its just a plot device that you can blow up and rebuild with no consequences.
Exactly
Explaining a computers to someone from 1723: "So you see the lighting up there? We learned how to make it, control it, and use it. So we make some lightning and we add a bunch of math and put the mixture into a box. From there we have a tool that has more knowledge in it than the whole of the Library of Alexandria. We largely use it to argue with people and look at pictures of naked people."
Funny how the Klingon homeworld is so very unprotected from infiltrators. I guess Starfleet isn't alone in that stupid policy of leaving Earth unprotected.
Transwarp beaming, what would the defence even be?
@@Valen-mh9fhShields. Can't beam through shields.
Meh. The first one has Leonard Nimoy in it. I like it the most.
Facts, I was baffled when he said Into Darkness is considered the best😂
Garbage with Leonard Nimoy is still garbage
He really overstayed his welcome in the franchise in my opinion. The fact that nobody watches TOS yet everything is Spock in every show shows that.
I don't understand how Kirk was given the captain's chair after several months in the academy. Since this is a new timeline, it would have been really interesting to see the roles reversed where Kirk becomes the first officer and Spock is the captain.
But i do think they couldve made Spocks temper tantrum at the end work... if the audience was involved and IF they suggested that he couldnt control himself, even after he got back to the ship. It would be an incite into the mind of a Vulcan. We would finally be able to see how wild and dangerous they really are without logic
When I saw it in the theaters, initially I enjoyed it for what it was. But just like the force awakens, into the darkness has not aged well. In fact, the older gets the more glare in the parent. The films plot holes and flaws are glaringly obvious.
Very common JJ effect for a movie.
But those lens flares...so epic. * yawn *
I nearly vomited while watching the TFA for the first. It hurts my brain that people actually think it was good
Into Darkness is the best Star Trek movie. People need to stop crying about it. (Though BC overacts.)
@tomcruisenukedmyaccount5388 hahaha, I don't know what you have been smoking, but it's some powerful stuff
You are absolutely correct. The cherry on the cake was that awful shoehorning in of Leonard Nimoy for that poorly scripted scene in which he warns them about Khan, Utter nonsense. I like to pretend this trilogy of films never existed.
Khan being 300 years from the past but capable to build weapons and ships in the current time reminds me of Howard Stark telling Tony how he was limited by the technology of his time. That's my only way to argue how it can work here.
The number difference is just far too large. Even more so the technology difference and state of the Federation and Starfleet.
>>Howard Stark telling Tony how he was limited by the technology of his time
All three films were dumb. Dumbed down versions of Star Trek. Sulu holding a baby with his spouse, Kirk on a motorcycle with rock music, Spock kissing Uhura.... it's all like a bad dream. No real soul or logic.
You are so right.
LENS FLARES!!!! (all I remember, save for the recycled Khan plot)
I should think if you went back 300 years and asked someone's advice on wifi it'd be a hell of a lot better than asking Jar Jar how to make a good movie.
Towards the end of movie , Spock and Khan are fighting, can not beam them up, but can beam down someone.
I think J J Abrams owes every Star Trek and Star Wars fan an apology for the crap he has put on screen for both of these iconic franchises.
Totally agree with you on this one. Oh, and Cumberbatch was a shocking choice for Khan.
Apparently, they knew how the movie was going to turn out since it was aptly named.
Into "poopness"
Remember this is the film that get JJ Abrams the Star Wars director,s chair....
Near the start of the movie there's a scene after the archives get bombed when all the senior staff are assembled. Kirk asks why anyone would blow up an archive, then realizes that in the event of a terrorist attack all the most important leaders would be gathered in that room. Then Khan attacks that room.
I thought it was a brilliant twist. Khan was maneuvering pieces on a chessboard. He hit a low security, unimportant target to compel the behavior of his adversaries and put them right where he wanted them to be so he could take them all out at once.
Oh, but then it turns out the archives WERE actually a high value target because Section 31 was secretly operating out of them and Khan NEEDED to attack them... I really felt like they took too scripts and smashed them together without thinking about how they contradicted each other.
When "Spock" screamed Khan, I stood up, looked around, shook my head, and went home. Because FUCK THIS SHIT
It's clear how JJ simply wrote a handful of 'epic' twists/moments and then just strung them together with narrative mush.
Scotty resigning is the one smart part of this movie. No head of engineering would stand by while “experimental” warheads are loaded on board.
It's a trademark of JJ Abrams' style of writing these movies that the whole plot falls apart if he allows the audience even a second to think about what was just said by the characters
Truly one of the filmmakers of all time
Abrams is a lesser Zemeckis.
I like how Spock could call for help, but calls old Nimoy Spock instead. Okay.
I must say, I audibly laughed/groaned/mockingly said "OK" in the theater when Kelvin Spick yelled out "Khaaaaaaaaan!" I try not to be rude, particularly in public, but it just came out.
There's the logical disconnect of being able to converse with Spock Prime on New Vulcan just minutes after Uhura said all comms were down, but then there's the inability to contact Starfleet after this exchange even though Enterprise is in visual range (much less the gravitatuonal pull) of Earth!
The real kick in the teeth was Khan saying "All I have to do is target your life support system, _located behind the aft nacelle..."_ to know the writers thought their audience were complete idiots mesmerized by any polysyllabiac technobabble.
the moment khan killed the klingons... my response was. Oh, he's an augment. They had khan moving like the Augments did in Enterprise. Which had me wondering which augment he was, which batch, and if the torps were more of the augments
In the original Wrath of Khan, even then, he struggled to use the Reliant properly, since he didn’t know where the override was.
That throws a wrench into the plot of Into Darkness right there.
Thanks for telling us about Star Trek Continues. I binged the whole 11 episodes in one sitting that very evening.
THE best new Star Trek I've seen since 1969! (Yes... I saw TOS during its original run. Not much of the 3rd season, though, as they moved it into a time-slot that was past my childhood bedtime)
Why couldn't Paramount have done something like CONTINUES in all these decades?
How would the torpedoes even work? 80% of the internal space is taken up by a cryogenic container, there is no room for fuel, explosives or control systems.
Jar Jar is too busy shining flashlights into the camera to worry about the story.
I haven't watched ST Into Darkness, so this is the first time I'm hearing about the torpedoes. However, I find it amusing that they didn't think about the implications of size. Mass matters...
In a story I wrote, I have a scene with an AI battleship in for reload. He's paranoid for a good number of reasons, and he's thinking, that this is a good opportunity for saboteurs to board. After checking all the cam-footage of the usual and less-than-usual methods of slipping aboard, he considers the 16" ammo that is being loaded. He quickly brushes off the shells, as the saboteur would need to be as small as his commander in order to fit (she's notably less than 5 feet tall), so it's a non-starter. The propellant cans however, would not only provide enough room for a body, but also some supplies to wait a few days. Then he thinks that it's a moot point, because everything coming aboard is being weighed by his own equipment, and nothing weighs saboteur. For perspective, a shell weighs nearly a VW Beetle, and a propellant can holds three bags weighting 50kg each.
there are VERY few people who believe that this film was the best of them. It was mostly considered terrible.
I never really felt much from watching those movies. I never put enough thought into it afterwards. Your analysis is spot-on and explains the reason why I never felt much from those.
What is with the obsession of Star Trek to turn augments into superheroes? In the Original Series and Deep Space Nine, they where just the peak of what humans can be.
But starting with Enterprise, they could move like they where in the Matrix and in this movie, Khan can literally resurrect the dead.
The classic case of "we have to elevate the threat in every instalment or the audience will get bored".
I remember they are like the people in the movie Gattaca. Nothing special, just the best possible genes you could have, some people are lucky to have that, now we all can be lucky.
Impossible to say how much genetic engineering could boost Khan's value as a weapon designer. Imagine an ape that could build spears and train other apes to use pikes in a phalanx formation against other apes.
I must admit. I enjoyed it. Thing is i'm a massive Star Wars nerd, with very little knowledge of Star Trek. Super casual, at best. But as a Star Wars guy, I now feel your pain. I get it.
I remember thinking, why all the panic to catch Khan at the end for his blood, when they had all this crew is the missiles which all had the same magical blood... Oh yes, and the cured death from then on!
As a long term Bab5 fan, all throughout this movie, I was somehow waiting for a plot ‚twist‘ of some sort. Like they had Khan’s crewmen’s brains hard-wired to the torpedoes to give them superior agility or aiming and tracking.
Maybe the writers even played with that idea and forgot about it along the way XD
Gone are the days when Star Trek made you think.
I've seen this film a couple of times and I never even knew there was a plot about bringing Khan back and torpedos 🤣
Its because writers today have no idea how to write, random action, random shock value, and NSFW drama mixed together like a throw of the dice. Its to writing what the hologram at the end of "Virtuoso" (star trek voyager) was to music composition!
NuTrek and Disney Stellar Conflict are not Star Trek and Star Wars. They're expensive Spaceploitation films.
Marconi, Guglielmo Marconi... that's the guy you need travel back in time to meet to ask how to enhance your 21st century WiFi reception. I mean didn't he pretty much pioneered "wireless"?
It should have been called "Into Dumbness"
It's too bad that Ed Wood was deceased when Abrams decided to attack Star Trek with a meat cleaver. Wood's films had generally better scripts so he should have been hired as a story consultant.
Most of the opinions I've heard have ranked Beyond as the best. I kinda tend to agree. The first two were packed with references, and there was a lot of effort put into making sure people noticed them. Beyond, on the other hand, in spite of everything else, at least focused more on the story, instead of trying to impress the audience with references. It had plenty wrong with it. They all had their flaws, but I at least felt like the story was original, and it placed before us, to accept or reject.
The way I see it, one of JJ's problems is that he tends to be passive & doesn't stick up for his ideas. When describing Into Darkness, there were a few times, where he said that he had been over-ruled. It sounded like Into Darkness might have been less of a parallel to Trek II at one point. I laughed when Spock yelled Khan's name. It had no where near the weight of the scene from the original film, and it sounded ridiculous to me. I do like that JJ stuck up for fans, when it sounded like the studio was set on going after fan productions.
In general, I found the movie series mostly harmless, compared to what they're doing with the property, now. Aside from Spock leaving the original universe, there was really no real impact on the classic stories, you could pretty much go back & add on to where Nemesis left off, if you wanted to ignore the Kelvin films. I didn't mind the films. I kinda liked the story that the first film had, as far as Pike being a mentor to Kirk. They're not strong films, though, and I wouldn't try to defend them to anyone that disagrees.
Scotty shouldn't have questioned the torpedoes that were brought onboard, he should have trusted the science! 😏
I could not really imagine how they put such great actors into such a movie that looks like a video game. Spock is just unrecognizable.
Yep.
They had a great cast to remake the Gary Mitchell incident, and chose to do a butchered remake of Wrath.
Just look at the scene with him in the force field brig and ...Kirk Spock and Alice Eve in her Sally Kellerman hairdo or wig.
They managed to find a McCoy who is just as McCoy as McCoy was.
@@Zodroo_Tint From what I've heard about Karl Urban, he probably went out of his way to do McCoy correctly AGAINST orders from JJ.
I'm still not entirely sure why they needed Khan's blood in particular to save Kirk. I mean, they had 72 of Khan's people on ice, right there on the ship...
I saw this movie in the theater. Halfway through it, I already hated it. By the end, I hated myself for seeing it.
Explosions, screaming, phasers, mindless action, lens flares.
Pretty much sims up all 3 Kelvin films.
I’ve thought about this particular sequel a lot, being an absolute fan of the original. While they missed a ton of opportunities, one that just jumps out is having the crew stumble upon Khan with no knowledge of who or what he is and having young Spock talk to old Spock about who this is and what risk he poses to the galaxy. Would have been a sweet and interesting moment in the movie and like not having the original Star Wars characters back together in episode 7 is a major miss that can never be fixed. We truly live in an age of some really stupid film makers.
Oh almost forgot, it’s the same stupid film maker.
Just remember lots of explosions, and being like, yeah, that was ok. Then thinking - that made no sense.
I love your analysis of this movie. It’s so on-the-nose. Please do more.
OH YES !!
This is what we like the most about this channel.
We need more of this.
While I detest this film, The one scene I did like was Khan dropping two platoons of Klingons like they were nothing, We have been told much of the Superior Intellect. However the superior strength was only shown when moving battle damage debris on the USS Reliant bridge. We saw a bit of the Augment combat prowess in Enterprise, so I thought it was a nice add. I know it was an action segment solely to keep your attention and in the writes mind 'move the plot' forward but I still liked it for the reason stated. Excellent work as always Dave, see you next time.
My only memory from this film was walking out of the cinema thinking: "I didn't understand the plot of this movie". Now finally someone explained it to me, tnx :D
Great video!
I liked the 2009 movie enough to watch it more than once. I watched Into Darkness. I know I did. I remember none of it and even some of the plot points you had here aren't sounding familiar to me. That's how gawdawful it was. And Benedict Cumberbatch is a great actor so I can't/shan't blame him. I have seen nothing past Into -Idiocy- Darkness and I don't miss it in the slightest.
... another example of terribleness is the prisoner exchange. now the movie was a while back, thats why i had to read a synopsis to get some of my memory back but here it goes: cumberbatch has the captain hostage and spock exchanges him for something that cumberbatch wants. cumberbatch than announces to destroy the enterprise which he was capable of. at that very moment spock should have said that he tricked khan and the thing that khan wanted in the exchange was still on board and thus preventing the destruction of the enterprise. this would have sparked another round of negotiations and which spock would have had the upper hand. vulcans are supposedly smart...
I remember being so bothered by the idea in this film that Khan's blood could cure death and how, since they have this technology figured out, no one would ever die again... and then it's all but forgotten by the next film. If they wanted a gimmick to bring Kirk back, I wish they had just thought of something, anything, that wouldn't lend itself to future replication, like some technology Khan had that was used on Kirk but in the course of the film was destroyed. But whatever, the film was just a complete mess.
If Khan's blood worked like that, none of his people would've even aged in Star Trek 2. All that Khan was supposed to be is genetically advanced - along the lines of Captain America - a physically perfect human being, not some kind of god with healing blood.
One of the stupidest things you actually missed:
So, they're at Warp, trying to get to Earth - Smart, because if the Juggernaut or whatever follows them there, it'd expose the ship to everyone *and* have to fight a whole fleet.
But, the Juggernaut is faster, the Enterprise gets intercepted - at high warp - only to find themselves..... IN EARTH'S GRAVITY
I didn’t hate that movie. My expectations were low for all of the reboot movies, so they were all a big “whatever” for me. Strictly fan fiction. And I fully expected the memberberries they gave us in the climax.
JJ “Repurposer” Abrams.
He did it with ST: Into Darkness, he did it with SW: Force Awakens.
When I think about this movie I remember that it was the first time a studio outright lied and tried to deceive fans.
The fans had sussed out that this was a Khan remake and were asking about it to producer, actors, even the director. And they all said no.
I remember realizing that the producer were treating fans like they were stupid. And after watching the movie all doubt was gone.
Wouldnt it be obvious the torpedoes look 300 years old and not new top secret design? 🤔