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Secondly, the love interest between Spock and Uhura. W. T. F. Hollywood REQUIRES a love story, so this bit of absurdity was injected into Star Trek. Yes, I get that the timeline was altered from the day little Jimmy Kirk was born, and that anything could theoretically have happened, but come on.

Which leads me to the minor problems. Time travel in itself is not such a huge deal. Many Star Trek episodes and films have used it to explain things or just to create a good story. (Star Trek IV was a damn good story even though it made time travel look like a walk in the park. I mean, if you can time travel with an old Klingon Bird of Prey, you could probably do it with a suped up shopping cart and a dilithium crystal.) However, using time travel to completely unravel and rewrite the entire Star Trek history - that's a bit... much. I get that we're trying to lure in new fans. But at what cost? What Abrams has done here is create an entirely new space story that is essentially not Star Trek, but that uses all of the characters from Star Trek.

Besides which, an entirely new history that doesn't include the planets of Romulus or Vulcan?? The sequel(s) is now going to have to focus on another race for the antagonist (perhaps Klingons), or (and this is my fear) create a new race. Star Trek has enough major races. Any attempt to create a new major race since Deep Space Nine has failed. (See: Kazon, Xindi, etc.) They can't use the Cardassians because they haven't become a militarized society yet. (Unless the time travel changed history... sigh.) The Borg are still a long ways off (and have been featured enough already). Ferengi do not make good movie villians. The Dominion are still in the Gamma Quadrant. (Time travel history change? Arrrg!)

Sounds like I hate the movie, but I don't. I'm only this critical because I love Star Trek, and I don't want to see it devolve into something it shouldn't. As I mentioned before, I think the casting was excellent - especially the role of Dr. McCoy, played by Karl Urban. The only real casting oddity I saw was the role of Spock's father Sarek, played by Ben Cross. Cross did an adequate job, but Sarek just isn't Sarek without Mark Lenard. Unfortunately, Lenard died in 1996, so there was nothing Abrams could do about that. Oh, and Winona Ryder as Spock's mom was a little... creepy. And she probably stole some of the set props and costumes on her way out.

I was particularly amused with old Spock showing Scotty his own formula for warp speed transporting since it's Scotty who shows that dude in 1980s San Francisco how to create transparent aluminum ahead of his time in Star Trek IV. McCoy: "You, uh, do realize of course that by giving him the formula we're altering the timeline." Scotty: "How we know he didn't invent the thing?" *smiles all around*

The use of the original bridge sounds (that beeping!) and original Star Trek theme was nice. At this juncture, I have to point out that Michael Giacchino scored the soundtrack and did an excellent job, as always. Abrams used Giacchino on his TV shows Alias and Lost (as well as his movies), so that explains why he was chosen for Star Trek. But besides that, Giacchino is just a great composer. I will always know him as the genius behind the Medal of Honor series music.</lj-cut>

All in all, it was pretty a pretty decent flick when you consider this was supposed to be a franchise reboot. I told Dad I didn't want to be the old guy scared of change, so I am trying to keep an open mind about all of this. I think most Trek fans will enjoy the movie, but not as much as if it had been done by a "real" Trek guy with the "real" Trek actors (be they original series or Next Generation).

But, as Q says in the final episode of TNG, "All good things..."