Star Trek Into Darkness: Film Review

*CAUTION: This review contains spoilers for Star Trek Into Darkness. If you haven't seen it and wish to do so, proceed with caution.*

The perils of rebooting entertainment franchises is that you have two things to do to make it worthwhile.

One is keeping the old fanbase happy, and the other is drawing in a new one to supplement it. These factors are important in making a workable construct from the ashes, because it is no point in making it if everyone who loved the old version hates it and the new crowd are similarly rendered uninterested.

JJ Abrams seems to be becoming a go-to man for success with this, given he is entrusted with the anticipated Star Wars re-boot to go with the succesful Star Trek reboot. He was given the keys to the Starship Enterprise for it's 2009 re-boot, which was a great success. Four years down the line and the adventures of Kirk, Spock, Uhura et all continue to an even stronger buzz.

We're beamed into the action mid-adventure, with Kirk (Chris Pine) running across planet Nibiru before bailing out Spock (Zachary Quinto), who is in a deep spot of bother in the middle of an erupting volcano.

Although he bails out Spock before the half-Vulcan is swallowed by a volcano-cancelling bomb, Kirk violates 'the prime directive' by allowing the planet's people to see the USS Enterprise, which is duly worshipped by them. As a result, Kirk is demoted to First Officer while Spock is shifted to another craft.

Not that it's going to be a smooth ride in his new position, with rogue Starfleet agent John Harrison (Benedict Cumberbatch) running amok. Harrison manipulates a man into unwittingly blowing up a secret base in 23rd century London, before heading over to California to take out the council.

As an Englishman, it is amusing to see the idea London in 2253 would still have Big Ben, St. Pauls' Cathedral and the Gherkin. The city is also extremely well-visualised, as is a mesmerising explosion of both the secret base and the Starfleet HQ. This leads to the death of many officers, including Kirk's mentor Admiral Pike (Bruce Greenwood).

This duly leads to a chase on Kronos, home of famous Star Trek villains The Klingons. However this is where some of the weakness rears. For a supposedly formidable and dangerous species, it is ridiculously easy for Harrison - with a little help from Kirk and Spock - to take them out.

Beyond the main heroes and villain, a lot of the characters are fairly clunkily written. It's almost a disservice to the main people and the beautifully realised landscapes that it's tricky to engage with everyone else.

Luckily, then, that the main cast get the bulk of the camera-time and perform well. The central Kirk and Spock relationship is in full strength, as is the adjoining relationships with Uhura (Zoe Saladana). The triumvulate of Pine, Quinto and Saldana certainly do their best to enact their legendary roles and pin the juggernaut to the ground.

Other standouts aboard the Enterprise are Dr. McCoy (Karl Urban), who delivers a stream of sarcastic barbs as the counter to Kirk, and new recruit Carol Marcus (Alice Eve), who is impressive in depicting a quite impressive combination of varying roles. A fairly amusing Scottish accent aside, Scotty (Simon Pegg) also provides a great feeder line.

Harrison is duly captured rather than killed as ordered. In captivity, he drops the mask, revealing himself as legendary Star Trek villain Khan. He says he is the ambassador for a crew frozen in deep space after a long galactic war, with the 72 men of said crew frozen and hidden into the Enterprise's torpedos.

This sees the usual flip-flop so common in film, where the crew are trying to help Khan defeat the seemingly evil boss of Starfleet only to find out they were unwittingly aiding his evil scheme and damaging their own side.

Saying that, the fact the head of Starfleet was about to down the Enterprise in a ship co-designed with Khan didn't exactly point to a wholly-honest chap behind the keys.

Khan duly downs the Enterprise, with only some near-fatal (in the end) action preventing the ship crashing into the seas of Earth.

However, the last thing the Enterprise crew did before being blown out of orbit was to detonate the torpedos, thus seemingly killing the stored humans (ultimately they don't as they'd been covertly moved). As a result, an enraged Khan deliberately flies the big Starfleet ship into San Francisco. This leads ultimately to a Spock vs Khan fight.

One person at the showing said it was like "the ultimate fan-fiction" but it is very well-realised, both in terms of plot and the eventual fight atop of a thriving and bustling 23rd century city.

There's a few quirks and quibbles but ultimately this is a very satisfying continuation of a surprisingly impressive reboot. It certainly has the pieces set to boldly go where no trilogy film has gone before - a 3rd film that surpasses the others.

3.5/5