Movie of the Week: Star Trek - Beyond

[jacey]

H and I have been so looking forward to this for months, and we were not disappointed. H thought it was possibly the best of the three ST reboots so far. maybe I wouldn't go that far, but I did enjoy it. The Enterprise is three years into her five year mission, with both Kirk and Spock starting to wonder if they need a new direction. When they stop over at Yorktown, a massive Federation city in space they get involved in answering a distress call that leads them into a nebula to rescue shipwreck survivors. It's a trap. Enterprise is attacked by a swarm of ships and the survivors end up on the planet Altamid where Krall has enslaved a variety of survivors (from the Enterprise and various other wrecks). The Enterprise crew is split up: Scotty is recued by a loner called Jaylah (who has escaped imprisonment by Krall and is repurposing a crashed federation ship); Spock and McCoy have adventures with emergency surgery; Sulu and Uhura are enslaved, and Kirk, Chekov and the somewhat devious Kalara end up together. It takes all of them to beat the forces ranged against them. Star Trek works best when the ensemble cast comes into full play as it does here.

There's lots to like, good action, fine effects, a more or less logical story and some character development. All the main actors turn in good performances, especially Simon Pegg who has some good snarky lines with Jaylah. (Pegg co-wrote the script, so perhaps not surprising that Scotty plays a pivotal role.) Sofia Boutella is great as Jaylah. Chris Pine's Kirk seems to be growing into his role as captain.

Sadly, during production, the film saw the passing of Leonard Nimoy (probably while the film was still in pre-production) and Anton Yelchin (just before the film opened). Nimoy's passing was acknowledged with the 'death' of original timeline Spock on New Vulcan (which affected new-timeline Spock). and both actors were acknowledged in the credits. The film is dedicated to the memory of both Leonard Nimoy (“In loving memory of Leonard Nimoy”) and Anton Yelchin (“For Anton”).