Thursday night in Burbank was the last stop in awards season, with the 40th Saturn Awards – honoring the best in science fiction and fantasy. Last summer’s Star Trek Into Darkness went into the night with five nominations, but got shut out. There were also more Trek-related winners and losers at the Saturns. Details below.
Into Darkness falls to Gravity at the Saturn Awards
The 40th awards show for the Academy of Science-Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films was held tonight in Burbank, CA. JJ Abrams’ 2013 feature Star Trek Into Darkness was nominated for five Saturn Awards, but wasn’t triumphant in any of its categories. The big winner of the night was Warner Bros Gravity starring Sandra Bullock and George Clooney. The film picked up five awards, three of which were in categories with Into Darkness. The table below details the results.
| Into Darkness Nomination | Winner |
| Best Science Fiction Film | Gravity |
| Best Director: J.J. Abrams |
Alfanso Cuoron – Gravity |
| Best Special/Visual Effects: Roger Guyett, Patrick Tubach, Ben Grossman, Burt Dalton |
Tim Webber, Chris Lawrence, David Shirk, Neil Corbould – Gravity |
| Best Supporting Actor: Benedict Cumberbatch |
Ben Kingsley – Iron Man 3 |
| Best Costume: Michael Kaplan |
Trish Summerville – The Hunger Games: Catching Fire |
Into Darkness isn’t the first Trek film to get shut out at the Saturns. All the Star Trek films with the exception of Star Trek V: The Final Frontier received Saturn nominations ranging from two (Generations) to ten (The Motion Picture and First Contact). Four Trek films picked up one award at the Saturns (Motion Picture, The Voyage Home, The Undiscovered Country and 2009’s Star Trek.). Wrath of Khan took home two and First Contact has the record with three wins.
The Saturn Awards marks the end to ‘award season.’ All in all Into Darkness was nominated for three People’s Choice Awards, three Film Critics’ Awards two Teen Choice Awards, an Academy Award, a BAFTA, an MTV Movie Award, an Empire Award along with some guild technical awards…none of which it won. So far the only awards won were a Britannia Award for Benedict Cumberbatch, a Satellite Award for the Blu-ray release, and a Hollywood Movie Award for JJ Abrams, plus one silver and two bronze awards at the Key Art Awards (for a trailer and the Star Trek app).
Star Trek Voyager star Robert Picardo presenting Saturn Award for Best Makeup Effects (photo @WarnerArchive)
Star Trek TNG Blu-rays win again + Trek nonfic author honored
And for the second year in a row, CBS Home Entertainment won the for Best DVD or Blu-ray TV Series for Star Trek The Next Generation (Seasons 3, 4 and 5). Last year they won for Seasons 1 and 2. TNG beat out releases for The Adventures of Superboy (Season 3), Search (The Complete Series), Under the Dome (Season 1), The Walking Dead (Season 3), and The White Queen (Season 1).
Author Marc Cushman received a Special Recognition Award for his two recent Star Trek books "These are the Voyages: TOS: Season One" and "These are the Voyages: TOS: Season Two," which detail the making of the original Star Trek series and cover the making and development of each episode. This project took six years of research to complete. The third book (Season 3) will be published later this year.
Mark Altman presenting Marc Cushman special award for his Star Trek non-fiction(photo Geek Magazine)
Fuller & McDowell Pick Up Special Awards + Fuller shares TV award with Bad Robot
A number of Star Trek alumni were up for awards and some were also getting special honors. Actor Malcolm McDowell (Soran in Star Trek: Generations), picked up the Life Career Award. And Star Trek Voyager and Deep Space Nine writing/producing vet Bryan Fuller was honored with the Dan Curtis Legacy Award.
McDowell receiving his Lifetime Award – presented by Lance Henricksen (photo Loretta Ramos)
In addition, Fuller’s latest series Hannibal was up for four awards, and took home two, including tying for Best Network Television series with the now-cancelled Revolution (produced by Star Trek producers JJ Abrams and Bryan Burk). One of the shows Hannibal beat was Sleepy Hollow (from producers Bob Orci and Alex Kurtzman). The Orci/Kurtzman produced sci-fi film Ender’s Game was also up for three awards, but came home empty handed. Also shut-out was The World’s End, which was up for three awards including Best Actor and Best Writer for Simon Pegg.
Fuller receiving his Legacy Award (photo Loretta Ramos)
Full list of winners is available at www.saturnawards.org.
Interesting …
Saturn awards, big deal.
Gravity deserves its wins.
Ben Kingsley as best supporting actor is a bit of a head-scratcher.
He was fine, of course—he is Ben Kingsley—but his performance in Iron Man 3 was just a bit of comic relief that wasn’t all that memorable.
Cumberbatch did a good job with the part he was given; it just wasn’t very well written and had him portraying a whiny little brat whose motive was thinking that, maybe, Adm Marcus has killed his 72 frozen buddies.
What a premise for a movie villain, ay? The old honest misunderstanding.
3. Cygnus-X1:
Agreed. It shouldn’t be assumed that Star Trek has a God-given right to win awards just because it’s Star Trek. It’s a hangover from the TNG era when Star Trek was the only significant scifi series around. The fact that STID won no awards isn’t even a demerit to the film: it just happened that there were other films the awards panel found more deserving.
I’m one of those people who had no issue with Cumberbatch as Khan, but I never saw him as the villain in the film. He was a p1$$ed off guy who had as big a beef with the main villain, Marcus, as Kirk’s team did.
Actually, I’d be all for a Khan spin-off with Khan out on the frontier seeking redemption. It would be interesting to keep Khan around as an anti-hero in this universe.
Gravity shouldn’t have won best sci-fi film. Personally I’m not a fan of it, but most people liked it so that’s irrelevant. But I can’t think of a single sci-fi element in it. Just because it’s set in space it doesn’t make it sci-fi. However Gravity certainly deserves the awards for VFX. The effects in STID were excellent but Gravity had possibly the best effects I’ve ever seen in a movie.
I too agree with Cygnus -X1 that just because it’s Star Trek, it deserves to win every single time.
I enjoyed Gravity as much as Star Trek Into Darkness, gave both 9/10,
As to Khan, I still have yet to read any real argument he was badly written, especially since 32 years ago, Khan blamed Kirk for leaving him and his Augments behind on Ceti Alpha 5 and the hell they had to endure just to survive, even though Kirk was not responsible for Ceti Alpha 6 exploding and shifting the orbit of CA5, nor could he have predicted what was going on in the Federation, the frontier beyond, nor being promoted to Admiral and made chief of Starfleet operations and thus never returning to CE5.
And Khan still wanted revenge for something that was totally out of Kirk’s control.
Gravity didn’t do much for me either. Sandra Bullock was,well, Sandra Bullock…as stranded astronaut who talks to herself a LOT as she encounters the most improbable series of unfortunate events. I mean, she REALLY had a bad day! lol Sure, it was fun…but no ground breaking science fiction in that movie!
And TrekMovie, really? Trying to stir the pot a bit with your graphics and headlines? I’m afraid the actual story doesn’t quite match the “dramatics” of your headline. Having said that, I’m glad there is more contributions to the site, maybe Pascale is letting go of some of that ad revenue to actually fund a staff.
6. Newdivide1701 – June 27, 2014
As to Khan, I still have yet to read any real argument he was badly written, especially since 32 years ago, Khan blamed Kirk for leaving him and his Augments behind on Ceti Alpha 5 and the hell they had to endure just to survive, even though Kirk was not responsible for Ceti Alpha 6 exploding and shifting the orbit of CA5, nor could he have predicted what was going on in the Federation, the frontier beyond, nor being promoted to Admiral and made chief of Starfleet operations and thus never returning to CE5.
And Khan still wanted revenge for something that was totally out of Kirk’s control.
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Yeah, some people may say that the Khan character was a bad choice for a movie villain. That’s debatable. Some may say that Benedict Cumberbatch was a bad casting choice for Khan. That’s debatable, and laughable when people start talking about Hispanic actors. *LOL* But anyway, like you said, no one can really say the part was badly written.
#8. LogicalLeopard – June 27, 2014
Yes, their choice of bronzer was the epic fail. For the life of me, how did CBS let the Coppertone branding opportunity slip through their hands with this picture’s licensing? ;-)
5. Captain Slow – June 27, 2014
Gravity shouldn’t have won best sci-fi film…I can’t think of a single sci-fi element in it. Just because it’s set in space it doesn’t make it sci-fi.
That was my first thought as well.
And then I realized that I didn’t think of Gravity as sci-fi because it was so realistic. Yes, I’ve read the criticisms about the incidences of inaccurate physics portrayed in the movie, by Neil DeGrasse Tyson and others. But what the movie gets right really does dwarf what it gets wrong, the latter of which was due creative license. However, that very creative license is what reminds you that Gravity is, after all, science fiction and not a documentary or bio-pic.
I think this is the Industry telling Paramount to hire real writers for Star Trek
#6 NewDivide1701: In TWOK, Khan was quite justified in his complaint. Out of Kirk’s control?! Nonsense! Kirk made the decision to place Khan and his people in the Ceti Alpha system, and then Kirk NEVER checked up on Khan to make sure they were doing okay. That’s two ways Kirk is responsible for Khan’s anger, and thus, Khan’s vengeance is well founded.
Oh, and it’s also obvious in TWOK that Khan is pretty much crazy after years of blaming Kirk, who was the only person Khan possibly could blame (besides himself) for his tragic life. That is a VERY human reaction, and something that makes complete sense.
As for Khanberpatch being well written…well, “My name isss….KHAAAAAANnnnnnnn” is just one example of the less-than-brilliant writing in STID. (It’s up there with Vader’s “Noooooooo!” as truly bad character writing.)
The Saturn Awards were right: STID did not deserve any of these awards. (ST09, on the other hand…)
8. LogicalLeopard – June 27, 2014
Yeah, some people may say that the Khan character was a bad choice for a movie villain. That’s debatable. Some may say that Benedict Cumberbatch was a bad casting choice for Khan. That’s debatable, and laughable when people start talking about Hispanic actors. *LOL* But anyway, like you said, no one can really say the part was badly written.
Of course one can say that the part was badly written.
It was badly written.
In TWOK and Space Seed, Khan was an uber-masculine, charismatic leader of men and seducer of women. He was a man who did all things with a well-defined purpose. He was a man of action. A man who said what he meant and meant what he said.
In STID they reduced Khan to a whiny little bitch who cries at the very thought of his friends being dead, even as he knows that they’re actually not.
And they made the same mistake with Khan as they did with Nero in ST09—they gave him a weak motive. Maybe my friends have been killed by Adm Marcus is a LAME and weak motive for a bad guy. There’s no advantage thematically or in terms of character arc in STID for giving the Khan a motive for murder which turns out to have been all a big misunderstanding. I mean, they could have derived some benefit out of such a motive by directing Khan’s arc accordingly, but they didn’t. Khan, formerly the super genius, man of action, as his defining act in STID, makes a mistake. Oh, my friends are all alive? Sorry, my bad. Khan has a weak motive as a result of the plot being poorly constructed. And just about every critic and most fans agree that the plot of STID was a mess.
Bad writing.
It will take years for the general public to take a liking to Into Darkness.
Kinda’ like Star Trek V
It’s not even just Khan that they lame-ified.
They’ve made Kirk and Spock lame, too.
They’ve turned Kirk into an irresponsible brat who has no business being in command of a state-of-the-art, incredibly powerful piece of equipment like the Enterprise, and who manages to make it through each story without ever really learning much of anything.
And they’ve turned Spock—the logical Vulcan character whose trademark was being cold, calculating and rational to a fault—into an emotional train-wreck who cries and has a temper tantrum in every movie and is more emotionally unhinged than his human crew-mates opposite whom he’s supposed to serve as a dispassionate counterbalance.
And since the logical Vulcan character is now a basket-case, there’s really no need for the character (McCoy) who used to serve as the heart/passion vis-a-vis Spock’s mind/thinking with Jim Kirk formerly balanced between the two polar opposites.
Now Kirk is a brat. Spock is a head case. And McCoy is just grumpy all the time with no real thematic contribution to make.
It’s all just terrible writing, honestly. And it actually makes STV look much better in retrospect. STV was a failure of execution, but at least there was substance, thoughtfulness and meaning at its core.
I have to agree that gravity was a better science fiction film than Trek ITD. Gravity had way less plot holes and broke less laws of physics than ITD did. I think it was just a battle of who broke the least laws of nature :-)
12. Cygnus-X1 said: ‘Of course one can say that the part was badly written. It was badly written.’
I think it wasn’t just the writing of Khan that’s an issue: the movie had Marcus as it’s main villain, then was supposed to hand over that role to Khan. It fatally unbalances the script. This universe’s Khan is a victim. Genuinely, I feel sorry for the guy. We know from the original universe that the guy can carry a grudge and when he’s annoyed at someone, he doesn’t go after them in a minor way! Even when he wreaks indiscriminate death and destruction at the end, though, I can’t entirely blame him. So his storyline makes it impossible for him to be the proper bad guy.
‘In TWOK and Space Seed, Khan was an uber-masculine, charismatic leader of men and seducer of women. He was a man who did all things with a well-defined purpose. He was a man of action. A man who said what he meant and meant what he said. In STID they reduced Khan to a whiny little bitch who cries at the very thought of his friends being dead, even as he knows that they’re actually not.’
The alt-universe thing, I suppose, gives us an out on that one. He’s called Khan, but he’s clearly a different person from the one in the original universe. I know we’re supposed to be dealing with a divergent timeline, but I tend to see the alt-Trek universe in the same way as the alt-universe from the Orci/Kurtzman series Fringe.
‘And they made the same mistake with Khan as they did with Nero in ST09—they gave him a weak motive. Maybe my friends have been killed by Adm Marcus is a LAME and weak motive for a bad guy.’
Like I say, I don’t think he’s the bad guy in the long run. Khan’s a lion Marcus released from his cage to wreak controlled havoc, only to find his pet lion turned around and ate him. Also, Kirk betrays Khan and shoots him on the say-so of a version of Spock from a parallel universe. I think Spock Prime was being bitchy and wanted revenge for the trauma of his own death.
‘Khan, formerly the super genius, man of action, as his defining act in STID, makes a mistake. Oh, my friends are all alive? Sorry, my bad.’
In fairness, the ‘torpedoes,’ had Kirk obeyed orders and fired them, would have killed Khan’s people, so Khan had every reason to think his people were dead. Effectively, they were. More than that, a genetically-engineered genius, being rather high-strung, probably would assume Marcus would be as ruthless as he (Khan) is.
‘Khan has a weak motive as a result of the plot being poorly constructed. And just about every critic and most fans agree that the plot of STID was a mess.’
Yeah, it was a mess, but I still enjoyed it. As I said on another thread, the film wasn’t worth the four-year wait to see, although I would have been fine had it turned up a couple of years after the original with another expected in a similar timespan (in other words, they’d be shooting Star Trek 4 by now!)
‘Bad writing.’
I’ve come across better . . . and worse . . . ;)
Gravity was a great movie deserving of its accolades, but yes it was entirely science fiction. It may have *looked* realistic, but there was absolutely nothing realistic about blowing up the Shuttle, Space Station, and Hubble with space debris (from satellites 22,300 miles up!) or astronauts be-bopping around in orbit as depicted in this movie. Never mind the last act where Sandra spacewalks for a long time in a spacesuit that has no oxygen tanks…
World War Z walking away with a Saturn award is the kind of thing that makes me lose faith in awards. That movie is the textbook definition of mediocrity.
@14 (Cygnus-X1): I think the real problem with STiD is not the characters themselves, but that they essentially did a “reset” on the characters in order to center a plot around. Remember, Star Trek 2009 had put the characters into place. However, because there was a complaint that Kirk going from cadet to Captain was seen as “unrealistic”, the writers wanted to address this in a round-about way. So, you have Kirk falsify a report (and lied about it, rather than justify his action on Nibiru), and Spock STILL having issues (though, IMO, this is somewhat understandable, since his entire planet “blew up”). And the problem with “Cumber-Khan” is that he didn’t have a clear motivation: was he the villain, or an anti-hero? This is on top of the fact that he was “white-washed”, and didn’t even behave like classic Khan in disposition at the very least. And there were a number of classic ‘Trek villains could have been used, but used Khan for his pop-culture recognition.
Still, I was entertained by this film, and still watch it once a week.
@ 2. Elias Javalis – June 27, 2014
“Saturn awards, big deal.”
LOL, I’m sure if STID had won the awards, you would consider the Saturn Awards the most prestigious in town :-)
@14 (Cygnus-X1): But I am not surprised that STiD didn’t win, since , as you put it, the writing was ‘lame’. Giving the fact that Lindelof was involved, I am not surprised.
@ 17. dswynne – June 27, 2014
“However, because there was a complaint that Kirk going from cadet to Captain was seen as “unrealistic”, the writers wanted to address this in a round-about way.”
And they addressed it brilliantly by demoting Kirk, 5 seconds later, he was baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaack, just BRILLIANT!
@ 19. dswynne – June 27, 2014
“But I am not surprised that STiD didn’t win, since , as you put it, the writing was ‘lame’. Giving the fact that Lindelof was involved, I am not surprised.”
Probably one of the good things about ST 13 that Lindelof is out for good. Lets just hope that no one will call him ever again.
#16. Thorny – June 27, 2014
“That movie [World War Z] is the textbook definition of mediocrity.” — Thorny
And deemed by Paramount as worthy of a special marketing release premium ticket double-bill with STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS, so maybe Para will let STID/BR share?
# 20. Ahmed – June 27, 2014
” And they addressed it brilliantly by demoting Kirk, 5 seconds later, he was baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaack, just BRILLIANT!” — Ahmed
Not just that, it brilliantly foreshadows reality. Rumor has in Bob’s Director chair has “IT’S GOOD TO BE THE KIRK!” emblazonedly embroidered on its back.
@23. Disinvited
“Not just that, it brilliantly foreshadows reality. Rumor has in Bob’s Director chair has “IT’S GOOD TO BE THE KIRK!” emblazonedly embroidered on its back.”
Indeed.
Kirk is fast tracked from cadet to captain of the flagship, taking over from his mentor Captain Pike.
Orci is fast tracked from writer to director of a tentpole movie, taking over from his mentor Abrams.
Life imitating art!
Of course it was shut out…it’s not a very good movie. I’m actually surprised it even got nominated for anything, aside from visual effects.
Meanwhile … congratulations to Marc Cushman for his well-deserved Special Award for writing “These Are the Voyages,” the definitive history of the production of the greatest television show of all time, Star Trek.
Scott B. out.
yeah, nu-trek is NOT sci-fi… even as fantasy, it sucks… thanks, boborci! =(
The “science” of Gravity was absolutely dreadful. Still enjoyed it, though.
12. Cygnus-X1 – June 27, 2014
8. LogicalLeopard – June 27, 2014
Of course one can say that the part was badly written.
It was badly written.
In TWOK and Space Seed, Khan was an uber-masculine, charismatic leader of men and seducer of women. He was a man who did all things with a well-defined purpose. He was a man of action. A man who said what he meant and meant what he said.
In STID they reduced Khan to a whiny little bitch who cries at the very thought of his friends being dead, even as he knows that they’re actually not.
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Did we watch the same movies? Lets take a look at this.
Ubermasculine: Khan wasn’t ubermasculine in STID? I would kind of consider taking on an entire patrol of Klingon warriors, breaking necks, and squeezing heads is pretty ubermasculine.
A charismastic leader of men: Didn’t get the opportunity to see that, because Khan was alone in this movie. There was certainly nothing to suggest that he wasn’t.
A seducer of women: He was only a seducer of women because he immediately perceived that McGivers was able to be seduced and give him an advantage in his situation. She was looking at him like adolescent girls look at Justin Bieber. Uhura probably didn’t give him the same open ogling, due to her being involved with Spock, so he decides to seduce Kirk instead….feeding him a dramatic tale about doing all that he did for his family, and asking him if he’d do the same. The teardrop is masterful *LOL* He’s not WHINING about it, you admit yourself he knows his people are alive. He shed the tears on command to help manipulate Kirk into believing him. And also, notice that he subtly attempts to isolate Spock (who isn’t going to buy into his display of emotional nonsense being a Vulcan) by insulting him in front of Kirk.
He did all things with a well defined purpose: In Space Seed, his purpose was taking over the ship for…uhm…what? I forget. In TWOK, his purpose was revenge on Kirk….which is pretty well defined. And in STID, his purpose was to get his people back. Pretty well defined.
A man of action/acting ruthlessly when necessary: See Klingon shooting, neck breaking, head popping comments above.
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And they made the same mistake with Khan as they did with Nero in ST09—they gave him a weak motive. Maybe my friends have been killed by Adm Marcus is a LAME and weak motive for a bad guy. There’s no advantage thematically or in terms of character arc in STID for giving the Khan a motive for murder which turns out to have been all a big misunderstanding. I mean, they could have derived some benefit out of such a motive by directing Khan’s arc accordingly, but they didn’t. Khan, formerly the super genius, man of action, as his defining act in STID, makes a mistake. Oh, my friends are all alive? Sorry, my bad. Khan has a weak motive as a result of the plot being poorly constructed. And just about every critic and most fans agree that the plot of STID was a mess.
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I don’t believe that Khan for a moment thought his friends were all dead. He was manipulating Kirk with a sad story that you fell for. His motive was always getting his people back and getting out from under Starfleet. That’s a well defined motivation, unlike Nero whose revenge was pretty silly. Saying that just about every critic and most fans agree that the plot of STID was a mess is just not true.
12. Cygnus-X1 – June 27, 2014
I forgot to mention that Khan’s tears and attempt at manipulation is in line with his character. In Space Seed, he attempts to appear non-threatening and weaker than he actually is, even feigning that he is too weak and tired to leave Sick Bay as I remember, but of course feeling good enough to study the Enterprise’s technical manuals. Khan is simply going to present himself however he needs to get what he wants.
“I am Not Herbert” is probably a TNG fanatic like that dullard Ahmed! Wouldn’t understand TOS if he was schooled on it by the ghost of Gene Coon himself! Its no wonder they dont get Bad Robot TOS based Trek!! lol
FACT!!
22. Ahmed – June 27, 2014
@ 17. dswynne – June 27, 2014
“However, because there was a complaint that Kirk going from cadet to Captain was seen as “unrealistic”, the writers wanted to address this in a round-about way.”
And they addressed it brilliantly by demoting Kirk, 5 seconds later, he was baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaack, just BRILLIANT!
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They didn’t address it by demoting Kirk. They addressed it by pointing out the havoc he potentially caused on Niburu, and the attitude he had. Showing that yes, he wasn’t as mature as he should have been to be a Captain. Addressing something doesn’t mean you have to change it. The demotion isn’t really addressing the the problem is – Kirk’s experience. And that was addressed throughout the whole movie. But as I’ve said before, Starfleet appears to be a purer meritocracy than most, and experience is less important. Look at hotshot Captain Tryla Scott from TNG. She was the youngest in SF history, and didn’t seem particularly humble too when Picard asked if she was as good as they said *LOL*
STID would have worked on a much better scale without Khan’s involvement and with Marcus as the main villain. He was a far more interesting character and Peter Weller was far more interesting an actor.
TUP, good to see you. I agree, STID should have had Marcus as its one villain.
Many months ago I very much enjoyed your take on Kirk’s character. I hope you have seen “Star Trek Continues.”
Obvious thing…STID is pure garbage….a bombastic piece of null made in Orci & friends company…a sub product made for easy movigoers, people who likes Michael Bay’ s transformers…same kind of noisy and ludicrous stuff…Crash Trek…
If this piece of garbage is the best thing nu trek can give….beh, garbage, and forgotten garbage…good.
It’s pretty hard arguing against any of them who won…except for Ben Kingsley over Sherlock. Gravity was a fantastic movie!
BTW, I have no problem with calling Gravity a “Science Fiction” movie. After all, the movie featured plenty of science, and it was a work of fiction…..
35. TUP – June 27, 2014
STID would have worked on a much better scale without Khan’s involvement
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Hmmnn…..well, it’s impossible to tell, because you’re comparing the movie that is real to the movie that is hypothetical. You’d have to really see that hypothetical movie to see how it works. But in general terms, yeah, I can see STID being a good movie without Khan. You’d have to get another terrorist to fill in, say John Harrison, and make him less Khanlike, which would also make him less interesting. But the payoff is when Marcus is revealed as the bad guy. It’d be funny to see, because I bet we’d get a lot of STID detractors saying, “Hey, what is this, a Tom Clancy novel?”
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and with Marcus as the main villain. He was a far more interesting character and Peter Weller was far more interesting an actor.
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More interesting character? Eh, I say Khan wins that hands down. More interesting actor? Now this is personal opinion, but am I the only one that thought some of Weller’s lines sounded clichéd and kind of wooden? I thought so in the theatre, but some of that was the material he was given to work with (“In the name of those we’ve lost, we’re going to hunt the **** down.”) I thought he shined after the reveal though, very good stuff. Love how they cut him off midsentence when he was going to fire on the Enterprise, like killing so many people is just an afterthought.
#37. “If this piece of garbage is the best thing nu trek can give….beh, garbage, and forgotten garbage…good.”
Balderdash! Speaking of “garbage”, back into the trash can you go, Oscar old boy. Yet another simpleton ignorant of the ways of TOS. Sad sad little grouch. Your assignment is to watch 2 episodes of TOS, there will be a test tomorrow!!
Of course Gravity was science fiction.
They were still using the Space Shuttle!
17. Dom – June 27, 2014
I think it wasn’t just the writing of Khan that’s an issue: the movie had Marcus as it’s main villain, then was supposed to hand over that role to Khan. It fatally unbalances the script. This universe’s Khan is a victim. Genuinely, I feel sorry for the guy.
I agree that the story’s ambivalence about who the real villain is was also a problem. And when Khan is weeping in the brig, being familiar with the Khan character as a master manipulator and possible sociopath, I assumed that Khan was doing a little act to play on Kirk’s sympathies and get him to fully trust Khan. But they didn’t even play up that angle of it. They just turned Khan into a whiny little bitch.
And “having every reason to believe that his friends were dead” is a LAME motive for the would-be villain of a feature film. Adm Marcus’s Dick Cheney motive was a good enough motive, but by having Khan commit an act of mass murder at the beginning of the story (two acts, if you count the archives), they diluted the sense of Marcus’s villainy to some degree. Sure, Marcus is still a bad guy—he tried to have Kirk & crew sacrificed to the Klingons in order to start a war with them—but we don’t really blame Marcus for wanting to kill Khan’s 72 buddies, if they’re all as much of a menace as he clearly is.
What can I tell you; it’s just bad writing that goes no where and has no point and nothing to say. What’s the theme of STID? Well, they have Khan say something to the effect of wouldn’t you do anything for your family? so, I guess that’s supposed to be the theme. But, do you feel that the story makes any relevant point or meaningful statement about family? Sometimes people will do anything for their family is a mundane notion which the movie does not even explore as a theme in any depth. These movies are so shallow and superficial, it’s ridiculous. They give you the gesture of a theme or the gesture of a concept here and there, at best. And ST09 didn’t even have a gesture of a theme. The entire movie was just plot exposition, unless you count Spock’s first temper tantrum and then learning his place from it as a theme.
I’m genuinely happy for you that this all doesn’t bother you much; I guess it just comes down to taste. But the writing in STID seriously hindered my ability to enjoy the movie. And I’m not even getting into the plot holes, bad science and how Khan is a supernatural being in the Alt Universe.
In TNG’s “Conspiracy” I always assumed that Captain Tryla Scott “made Captain” so quickly in her career because she was part of the alien-invasions tactical reassignment of “infected” Starfleet-officers. She may or may not have been qualified to be a Starship commander, but she’d only received her promotion because the aliens needed her for the many machinations they’d engaged in. Even within the episode I think it’s implied that she did as they’d planned – even destroyed Picard’s old friend Captain Walter Keel’s ship (in order to prevent him from exposing the alien-threat).
At IDIC – thanks! I’ve been back posting a bit in some of the other threads (debating/arguing etc).
Fill disclosure: I was in favour of Khan. I wanted to see a fresh take on Space Seed. But man did they muck it up. The movie actually would have been much better if it was revealed that Harrisson was lying and “Khan” was actually Jochin. You could still have the WTF moment when this pasty faced Brit admits to being Khan and then Spock Primes appearance actually matters when he says “hey wait y’all, that aint Khan”, giving Spock the knowledge he needs to out wit Jochin. End the movie with the camera panning over the tubes and lingering on the face of Ricardo Montalban.
As for Marcus, while it would have made the movie better to expand Weller’s role and make Marcus the chief villain, it would be yet another Star Trek story centering around our characters having to defy orders or work against a corrupt establishment. Enough already.
Also, it’s a crime that Marcus never said “Dead or alive, you’re coming with me”. Like, come on…
CygnusX1 – Just stop. You are repeating yourself on every single thread.
You also appear to lack any sense of sympathy for any of these human characters. Cumberkhan was both victim and instigator. He had as much *right* to be angry and vengeful as TWOK’s Khan, perhaps more so.
Why are so angry? Oh never mind, because I know I will get the same spiel about “bad writing” etc, the same stuff that you have been writing for months. Talk about not being able to let go and move on…:(
Too many rabid dogs with badly gnawed old bones in Tred *fandom*.
Malcom McDowell’s speech was priceless, especially the part where he recounts his conversation and time with Shatner on Generations.
He joked that killing Kirk was a favor to him to free him up for Boston legal.
31. LogicalLeopard – June 27, 2014
Ubermasculine: Khan wasn’t ubermasculine in STID? I would kind of consider taking on an entire patrol of Klingon warriors, breaking necks, and squeezing heads is pretty ubermasculine.
I wouldn’t. I’d call that “violence.” There’s more to masculinity than being violent. And I say this as a man who is not violent. If you want to understand what I meant, go back and watch TOS Space Seed. See how Khan is portrayed? Compare that to how he is portrayed in STID. You should be able to see a significant difference in the two characters.
I don’t believe that Khan for a moment thought his friends were all dead. He was manipulating Kirk with a sad story that you fell for. His motive was always getting his people back and getting out from under Starfleet. That’s a well defined motivation, unlike Nero whose revenge was pretty silly.
Really? Dom just said in #17 that Khan believed that his friends were all dead and had every reason to believe that. Which is it? What was Khan’s motive—irrationally lashing out to avenge the deaths of his believed-dead friends; or getting his friends back from Starfleet? If his motive was the latter, how did he expect to accomplish it by attacking Starfleet HQ and killing the people who were in the best positions to help him? Umm…hey, yeah…sorry to bother you Admiral Nice Guys, but Admiral Marcus is doing illegal, sinister things behind your backs and holding my buddies hostage to force me to help him. Could you guys maybe help me out, seeing as how Marcus is betraying every principle that you’ve sworn to uphold? Kthanks!!
The writing of STID is so bad that even people who were satisfied with the movie can’t agree on the plot and the characters’ motives.
Saying that just about every critic and most fans agree that the plot of STID was a mess is just not true.
It is, from my experience. Go read the reviews at RottenTomatoes.com.
See if you can find any reviews that have anything good to say about the writing in STID. They’re few and far between, if they exist at all. And most people here acknowledge that the plot is confusing, even if they liked the movie on the whole. You don’t even understand the plot, yourself. And I don’t blame you.
34. LogicalLeopard – June 27, 2014
They didn’t address it by demoting Kirk. They addressed it by pointing out the havoc he potentially caused on Niburu, and the attitude he had. Showing that yes, he wasn’t as mature as he should have been to be a Captain. Addressing something doesn’t mean you have to change it. The demotion isn’t really addressing the the problem is – Kirk’s experience.
HUH?!???
Of course they meant to address Kirk’s immaturity by demoting him. That was the whole friggin point!
Addressing something doesn’t mean you have to change it???
What, do you regard Star Fleet as like some preschool where they don’t want to hurt the feelings of their insubordinate, rogue commanders, so they just point out what they’ve done wrong and then leave them in positions of great responsibility hoping they’ve learned from their mistake? Now, Kirk…you disobeyed our most sacred principle and that was very naughty of you. You can still be captain of the Federation flag ship, but just don’t be naughty again, mmk? Now you can eat your ice cream.
35. TUP – June 27, 2014
STID would have worked on a much better scale without Khan’s involvement and with Marcus as the main villain. He was a far more interesting character and Peter Weller was far more interesting an actor.
I agree that Marcus was a more interesting character than what they turned Khan into. I think that B-Patch did a fine job with the part that he was given, but, like you I enjoyed the Marcus character more. As someone else said…maybe a critic…Weller played Marcus with just the right amount of a-hole in his tone, “Now, I’m gonna ask you again…one last time, son….”
I think that Peter Weller has been underappreciated for his performance in STID, which was totally believable. Everyone got all excited about B-Patch, and he did a fine job with what he was given, but Weller made it look so natural.