I watched Star Trek 2009 about a month ago. Part to see it again before STID and part to see if my negative memories of it had been trumped up by time (the memory cheats).
I still really disliked it. My misgivings are on file here somewhere.
Because I'm a "responsible adult" these days, the wife and I usually end up watching movies in 2 (or heaven forbid 3) sittings, which I'd prefer not... but it would mean watching one non-kiddie movie a month or so, which I can't say sounds any better.
That being said, night one of ST2009 ended with Scotty's Super Fun Water Slide after conveniently being teleported into the coolant tank. This of course, right on the heels of the Old Spock scenes, which are some of the most illogical (see what I did there?) scenes in a very illogical movie.
The upshot of watching movies in different sittings (not one that outweighs the down, but it's what I've got) is that it's easier to evaluate one part separately from another. If a movie has a stronger front end or back, it's harder to realize that when you watch them "all mashed up together" like that. :)
So the scene that directly follows the Scotty Slide is probably the one I would say is the best in the film- when Kirk has to compromise Spock's emotions. So much better than the "your mom goes to college is a human" bit with young Spock at the begining.
And then the ridiculous ending starts. Well, it was 7 minutes that I really found myself enjoying the picture.
So... last night we checked out Star Trek Into Darkness. I was prepared to hate it, given my reaction to 2009's outing, and I'm generally unimpressed with Kurtzman and Orci across the board. I spoiled everything in the movie back when it had its Australian release several weeks ahead of the domestic one. I believed the "callbacks to the good movies" were going to be lazy and stupid... and I thought the marketing/PR moves with the "is Cumberbatch Kahn? mystery to be really stupid. (Of course he is!) Bringing Kahn back for the 2nd movie seemed to be really uninspired.
All of that to say that I fully expected to hate STID. I would like to say that I give all movies a chance, even if I have certain expectations (likely untrue)... and I'd like to use STID as an example of that.
I quite enjoyed it! Sure, there were nits ripe for the picking... but somehow this movie won me over and engendered enough goodwill in me that those issues did not get in the way of my enjoyment.
There's not a lot more to say about it than that. I've heard a lot of 'love 2009, really liked STID" and a lot of "hate both of them" "they're the 2 best 'Trek movies ever" kind of commentary... but I haven't heard/seen my response- detest 2009, quite enjoyed STID.
4/5 proton torpedo coffins
