With the third installment in the rebooted Star Trek series, we are greeted with a safe and saccharine foul ball that sort of gets the job done.
Since Star Trek was rebooted, it’s been having a pretty great run, going well past it’s goal of being a blockbuster hit to include a gripping story and character development. However, with the latest installment, Star Trek Beyond, it does anything but go beyond what was required of it. While a film of this genre doesn’t need to reinvent the wheel, it needs to at least go where it’s gone before, not take a step back. This film is the definition of playing it safe, but it isn’t without it’s merits.
With a seasoned summer blockbuster director like Justin Lin, you can expect a few things. Great action, a fair deal of explosions, charming banter in times of peril, and an altogether lovable crew. Lin delivers this in spades but fails to do anything else. He shies away from emotional moments and avoids every opportunity to develop a character or create a connection with the audience. From start to finish, we are alienated from the crew of the Enterprise and are left with no real reason to root for Captain Kirk and his team to come through in the end, save for the fact that they’re the good guys. He skews the film in a direction that is altogether saccharine. None of the performances were standouts in either direction, but most were lackluster, save for Sofia Boutella who brought life and vigor to her role.
Lin doesn’t deserve all the blame. He did have to work with the source material and it wasn’t exactly Shakespeare. Simon Pegg and Doug Jung wrote the script. As you can expect from Simon Pegg, there was a decent modicum of tense situation defusing humor that couldn’t help but bring a smile to your face. When it worked at least. Other than that, the story is altogether too familiar, filled with cliches and tropes that you’ve certainly seen before. Many times during the film, you get the same sensation from watching a TV movie, the feeling that you’ve seen this plot done better in some other context, but you can’t quite place it. The script is altogether too predictable as well.
The other major falling point for this film is the fact that there is no fear of death. At no point will you ever feel that one of the main members of the enterprise were going to meet their end. Even when all seems lost, they find a way to very conveniently make it a happy ending. Unlike the previous films where you weren’t sure where they were going, you just know that at no point was this film going to take a serious turn and be forced to evoke any emotion or response from the audience.
This film hits all the marks for a great summer blockbuster. It has an interesting, diverse, and likable crew who have the odds stacked against them as they work together to save lives. However, it falls short of being great. With no connection or reason to care for these characters who, with every turn of fate, are destined to prevail, you will find yourself bored from time to time and be left with an artificial taste in your mouth. You may get the feeling that this film was concocted in a lab using a formula for a safe play to fill theaters and make money, but it was missing the immersive experience that connects the audience to a film and keeps them coming back for more. These flaws keep it from being great a leave it as a carbon copy of the previous film with a few cheap thrills.
Now, if you’re looking for a family friendly summer film, then this is a great film for you. However, if you’re looking for a great movie going experience, it might be best to look for an alternative as this is not the Star Trek you’ve come to know.
