(OT) Star Trek Nemesis

[Tempuswolf]

You seem (based on your continued insistence on referring to the movie as "Save the Whales,") to object to IV on the grounds of its ideology, which is admittedly delivered heavy-handedly. But as has been noted, Trek has never been known for subtly delivery of its messages. If you object to liberal messages laid on with a trowel you probably ought to stay away from Trek in the first place.

Heck, no, I am the token liberal in my group of friends and would rather see forced sterilization in Japan and Norway rather than the unilateral lifting of bans on whaling that these countries have made. Hyperbole aside, it's not the message I had a problem with it's the thin gruel of plot and dialogue that the message was served in. Preachy is okay with me as long as you're clever about it. I guess that's why I like Southpark which lampoons as many liberal sacred cows as conservative.

Of course you realize, as well, that the majority of folks (and critics) disagree with your assessment and feel that IV was one of the better movies in the series. It's not my favorite, but it's certainly not the crap sandwich you seem to think it is.

Unless we set up some objective standard for measuring the quality of the films, I am just as entitled to my informed, albeit subjective, opinion of the film as everyone else is; so it's still on the bottom of my list. If it's not your favorite, there was some quality you saw in it that raised it above the rest of the field, what was it?

Furthermore, the alien probe of IV is not a deus ex machina, but a Macguffin. It would help your point if you would keep your terms straight.

You're probably right about it not being a strict DEM since it appears so early in the film (I guess since the film was all downhill for me after it showed up, I erred, forgive my indulgence ); but Macguffin misses the mark as well since the significance of a Macguffin vanishes in the last reel, leaving only the conflict over it behind. If whalesong-countersong is not considered germane to the film, then the film devolves into Star Trek IV:Temporal Tourism: "Don't forget where we parked." "Where are the nuklear wessels?" and some nice matte work at the Monterrey Aquarium.

 

[the Jester]

Hmm, Assenpfeffer, I find it odd that you thought this was the worst of the even numbered ST films, but to each his own... I thought that the very personal nature of the Picard-Shinzon conflict added a lot to it- the idea of looking into a warped mirror and seeing all the qualities you abhor in your own face... I dunno.

I personally thought Undiscovered Country was weaker, but again, YMMV.

Tempuswolf, I'm also surprised you dislike IV so much- you're about the first person I've run into who didn't really like it (at least as far as Trek fans go). It had fantastic amounts of characterization and all the characters got a chance to shine (iirc). Plus, transparent aluminum!

But hey, it's all a matter of taste. I really liked it. I'm thinking of going to see it again while I can still catch it on the big screen, but Two Towers has to come first...

 

[Welverin]

Preachy is okay with me as long as you're clever about it. I guess that's why I like Southpark which lampoons as many liberal sacred cows as conservative.

Don't you mean "as many conservative sacred cows as liberal?" Matt and Trey are Republicans after all, so you should expect them to make fun of liberal viewpoints and the conservative ones that would be ignored by most creators.

 

[Darkness]

Wesley ... I hated his character from the first episode of TNG.

Same here.

----Spoiler Warning----


Data dying

In a word, YAY! I always hated him. He was marginally more tolerable than Wesley, though.

 

[Psychotic Dreamer]

Personally I was fairly disappointed with Nemesis. I've been disapointed with all of the TNG films. One thing I liked about 2,3 and 4 was they flowed together as an overall whole. Nemesis just seemed to be lacking that trek feel. I think if they stripped away the trek trappiings it might have been an enjoyable movie. Just my opinion.

 

[Ghostwind]

Finally got to see the movie today. It wasn't bad in my opinion. Not great, mind you, but not bad either. If you think of it as more of a higher budget episode rather than a movie, it came across ok. All in all, it felt like more of a family reunion. Everyone you know is there and they are all comfortable with that warm fuzzy feeling of being together. Kinda like ST:TMP was before you realized how really bad the story was.

There were a few plotholes big enough to drive a truck through, but I did enjoy the space combat sequence. I think they did manage to pull of the whole Data/B4 storyline without being too cheesy. I do agree that there should have been some mention of Lore somewhere in the script. The whole 'clone' thing is a tired plotline. Likewise, the corridor combat was a bit hokey (grenades anyone?). Apparently Sovereign class ships no longer have corridor forcefields that can be activated which would have trapped the Remans (remember how often we saw that trick being used during the series run?).

All in all, they did manage to provide enough to maintain continuity that was established during the series' run. I read the script about a month ago and there were a couple of great scenes that never made it to the final cut that would have filled in a couple of those holes. Maybe we'll get lucky and have a director's cut or special edition release right out of the gate rather than two years down the road. I hope the next movie puts the 'epic' back into the Star Trek genre. It's been missing for some time. I also hope that we get to see a movie where the Enterprise, for once, doesn't get her butt kicked from here to eternity. It's getting a bit old. Whatever happened to being the near indestructible jewel of the Fleet? Oh well, time to wait another three years or so and see what Paramount comes up with...

 

[Mathew_Freeman]

Then you, in all likelyhood, would have done a better job in this movie than Hardy did.

Now that's a compliment! Heck, if I make it into a mainstream sci-fi or fantasy movie, I'll make a point of telling you first!

 

[Kalshane]

What if they made their next movie not based on any of the tv shows and went with completely different people, and this crew was just for a few new movies? would that work?

Personally, I think it would be a good idea. The franchise is getting stale. They need something new to mix it up some, and Enterprise, unfortunately, is not cutting it.

I personally would like to see a movie adaptation or two of Peter David's "Star Trek: New Frontier" books. They're set in the Next Gen time period and have a good mix of interesting characters, drama, humor and witty dialogue. They also take place in the former Thallonian empire (made up by Mr. David, I believe, but a more knowledgable person than I might have a reference from one of the series'.) so we've got an area of the galaxy we haven't really seen explored yet, while at the same time close enough to "home" that you can still bring in the familiar stuff.

The only problem I see is David likes to give starring roles to characters that were bit parts in the shows. New Frontier features Next Generation characters such Commander Elizabeth Shelby ("Best of Both Worlds") as the First Officer, Dr. Selar (a couple of eps) as Chief Medical Officer and Lt. Robin Lefler (from "The Game" and one other episode) at Ops. Getting those actors together for the project might be difficult. (Especially since I don't really see Ashley Judd putting a Star Trek uniform back on to reprise her role as Lefler.)

The other problem is the ship features a Brikar (another creation of Mr. David, I assume) as security chief. Think Thing from the Fantastic Four. He'd most likely have to be CGI (though not as much of a problem if it's a movie. Gollum has proven that CGI characters can be viable if handled correctly.)

But all in all, the books are good stuff (they're the only Star Trek novels I actively try to keep up with) and I would love to see the crew of the Excalibur on the big screen.

 

[Hand of Evil]

What if they made their next movie not based on any of the tv shows and went with completely different people, and this crew was just for a few new movies? would that work?

I always thought they should do Captain Logs. X number of shows with this character, maybe following his moving up the ranks. It would also be interesting to see shows based on different captains from some of the different races, think about seeing the same same battle from each captain's view.

 

[EarthsShadow]

I still think they need Sisko in there in an upcoming movie. I know this is just my personal opinion, but I think he is the coolest of all the star trek captains/commanding officiers from any of the movies.

Especially if you have seen the episodes where the klingons go to DS9 and its the first time we see Worf on the show and they attack DS9 and Sisko kicks their butts and blows up 200 klingon ships. The way he looked at them and the way he spoke to them, it was just awesome. Plus, its the only episode where I saw a ship do a loop after getting its engines destroyed. I just can't remember the name of that episode, but it was a two parter and to me, no other episode comes close to being an exciting star trek show...with the exception of Q and his antics with the enterprise crew. He's cool.