Anthony and Laurie are joined by Matt Wright and Denes House to give an honest review of the Star Trek: Section 31 streaming movie, discussing the movie itself as well as the intention behind the creation of Section 31, how the movie fits in to the franchise both story-wise and industry-wise, and more. They also talk about the red carpet premiere and screening in NYC, which Laurie and Denes both attended.
Links:
Red carpet photos from the Section 31 premiere in NYC [Bluesky]
Watch: New ‘Star Trek: Section 31’ Promos Reveal More Backstory And Character Details
Early Thoughts On ‘Star Trek: Section 31’ (Spoiler-Free)
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So excited to be able to say I was one of the first to see this movie! I was lucky enough to go to the premiere at Lincoln Center with the NYC Away Team (you can join the fb group if you’re in NYC and want to connect with fellow fans, not to mention get exclusive access to screenings and premieres like this, shoutout Michael for organizing). I want to say I had no intention of watching this movie otherwise. My favorite part of the experience was at the very beginning, when I was surrounded by gorgeous young influencers who openly admitted they have never seen anything Star Trek. Then Alex Kurtzman took the stage to say how Michelle Yeoh was the driving force behind this project, and how determined she was to make it happen. She won her Oscar and immediately was like, I’m doing Section 31. I think that is really cool. She is such an icon and apparently every bit the incredible person we all want her to be, and it’s cool to think that she made Star Trek a priority at the height of her fame. She took the stage briefly and said some nice words as well. Then the movie started. And I gotta be honest, I knew going into it that it would be excruciating. And I’ll be honest, I was not prepared at all for how excruciating it ended up being. I was scratching my head from the earliest scenes. I couldn’t even tell you what the movie was about. I can’t describe a single character, can’t remember a single line of dialog. Except, I think, the line where Garrett says, “chaos is my friend with benefits.” She also says “I love that for us” like a complete millennial at the very end. So ok I do remember two awful lines. What else. The music was derivative. The editing was awkward. That weird stuffed animal bomb thing. I was in a theater with state of the art sound and I couldn’t hear or understand half the dialog. Truly baffling how they expect us to understand complex scifi ideas and technology when the actors are mumbling or racing through the lines. There were completely gratuitous fight scenes including one where it’s just Michelle doing Kung Fu with the bad guy while everyone watches and does absolutely nothing to help the situation. Enormous problems crop up only to be solved in seconds, at the same time that massive lapses in logic prevent any sort of comprehension of the plot or the stakes. Is that character dead? Are they even important? Even the writers don’t know. Things are both too easy and too complicated, and it’s apparent that this was a full series of ideas stuffed into an extended episode. There were incredibly awkward attempts at humor, even in a room full of people the jokes clearly fell flat. Despite this there were some laugh out loud moments, not in a good way. It was a really strange decision to write these characters in this way, and shoot them in this way, with this strange way of segmenting the story as a series of “transmissions.” It was a little uncanny watching the camera-zooms-in-fast-on-the-actors’-faces effect over and over again, not for anything dramatic but just cuz, like we’re watching a low budget TV movie from the mid 2000s pretending to be edgy. And I’m pretty sure there was a pop song that had a lyric about getting called on a phone, I very distinctly remember hearing “phone.” I think the best thing I can say about it is that I didn’t vomit, despite their best attempt to make me. I would never use the phrase, this isn’t Star Trek. I know better than to gate keep. But I will say this: I don’t even recognize what I watched. It was a 90 minute blur of colors and sounds that had almost no relation to anything I’ve ever seen before, Star Trek or otherwise. There were maybe 3 times in the whole movie I even so much as recognized a sound effect. It truly stands apart from everything that has ever come before it. And maybe there’s a reason for that. Maybe there’s a good reason why no one has ever made and executed these decisions in this sequence to end up with this result. I sat next to someone in that theater who had never seen anything Star Trek before, and she basically had the same reaction I had upon leaving the premiere: what did I just watch? I had drinks with the Away Team crew afterward, and many of them expressed the same sentiment. Two opposite ends of the spectrum: those steeped in the lore, and those oblivious to all of it. Neither walked away satisfied.… Read more »
Alex doesn’t listen to what the audience wants, so all we can hope for is that he steps aside.
Amen. The reviews are brutal and deservedly so. He needs to step down. At Comic con they describe this movie as “Brat”. They keep trying to appeal to an audience that does not care about Star Trek and never will. Can someone please send them a memo. I pray that Sundance cleans house. Tell Tawney her comedy show is not getting made after this. Please get Bad Robot out of Hollywood. Enough.
Agreed! This was sad to watch, it’s not Star Trek or entertaining. Lower Decks was not funny and STD’s redeeming quality was giving us SNW. The only way to go now is with Legacy no Academy and drop Kurtzman.
There was a tricorder noise from the Generations 1994 CD soundtrack, so it was clearly Star Trek.
I watched this movie in the small hours of Saturday morning and finally retired to bed quite depressed by what I had sat through. Your thoughts and feelings are very much aligned with my own. For me it was similar to what I would expect if Cannon Films (for those who can remember that far back) had decided to produce a Guardians of the Galaxy/ Men in Black knockoff mash up.
To be fair, I thought that the opening 10 min or so were okay but it fell off the proverbial cliff from the bar scene onwards.
As a life long Trek fan the questions for me are 1) how did this (my favourite) franchise get to this point and 2) what does this mean for the future of ST and ST streaming movies?
They should have given Matalas a meaningful role in ST after Picard S3 IMO while acknowledging, that there was too much nostalgia for some.
Great review man! 👍
You said everything I felt as well. And I would never recommend this to anybody. Utter crap.
I’ve watched it.. and.. it’s not as bad as some of the reviews I’ve read. turn your brain off, and it might even be enjoyable. It’s derivative and not Star Trek.. and I think the latter is a real benefit. yeah, there are some ties to the larger universe, but they’re just there and not harped on or focused on. That’s the smartest thing about this film. It’s not a good film, but there will be those that will find it enjoyable.
As I expected, a lot of people are doing the absolute most to trash this. I suspect they similarly decided to write the movie off the moment it was announced because they don’t like Georgiou.
It’s nowhere near as bad as they are making it out to be. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not great. But it is enjoyable in my opinion. It’s good, escapist, silly fun. Nothing everything in the franchise has to be a meditation on the human condition. This is for those fans who enjoy nonsense like alien sex ghosts, Janeway turning into a salamander, Quark’s antics on Ferenginar etc.
It’s overstuffed with characters we don’t need (what was the point of the Deltan lady). Cutting a few characters would have helped and extending the run time would be another bonus. This is Michelle Yeoh’s vehicle and she carries the film admirably. It’s a mid-tier Trek film made for 2025. Not the best, but this is not another Into Darkness or Nemesis. Nowhere near.
Any faint praise I give it is a result of very low expectations. But I will say.. the trailers looked like this was going to be camp. There’s a little.. this is mirror Georgiou we’re talking about. But it absolutely devolves into some very unnecessary silliness that is hard to abide if you want to take this movie seriously. It’s pretty ‘hand-wavey’ with some of the things they need to do to advance the plot, so it’s lazy as well. My biggest criticism from a Trek perspective is the whole mirror universe conceit, and how convoluted that is relative to this film. Can’t say much more without getting into spoilers, so I’ll save that for the spoiler review thread when it’s posted. It’s not a good film, but it’s not unwatchable, and I can get behind someone finding it enjoyable as action / sci fi if you just don’t think about it too much.
I think I’m going to sit out the discourse around this movie as I don’t much look forward to being ridiculed, bullied and disparaged for enjoying this silly bit of fun. Not a dig at you, Heyberto. I’ve always found you to be one of the nicest people who frequent this website.
I wouldn’t have taken it in such a way.. but thanks for saying so. I’m just sharing my feelings on it. I think I’m just surprised at how derided it was in what I read yesterday by non-Trek reviewers. As you said.. it’s not trying to be anything deep or revelatory. If this were going to series, I’d agree with the derision more.. but as a one off movie, if you find it enjoyable, then who am I to tell you you’re wrong? Now, if we want to get into a debate about the “Star Trek” of this film, I’ll no doubt eviscerate it, lol. But as a standalone piece of entertainment… it’s ok. No need to defend it if you just like it. I’m saying something I thought I wouldn’t…. I get people that will like it, even if I don’t. I’ve not felt that way about Disco or SNW.
It’s tremendously good for the pagh to learn not to care what other people think about the things you enjoy.
Agreed!
I just really love it when the only way to enjoy my star trek is to turn my brain off
Agreed. I prepared for the worst and for me it wasn’t. I give it 7.5/10.
Truly the worst Star Trek thing ever produced. Total cringe. “Spock’s Brain” without the brain.
I’d watch “Spock’s Brain” ten times in a row before sitting through this a second time.
I agree. At least Spock got his brain back.
I actually never hated Spock’s Brain as much as others do. Sure, it’s bad but in a so bad its good kind of way. And yeah still ten times better than this.
I’m sorry. But Section 31 is just a continuation of what my problem was with Disco. Poor and rushed writing, mixed easy to figure out plot lines. Everything is just in front of the viewer. Nothing has any depth to it. And you never actually see any of the XYZ bad people they keep referencing in the end. So, there are no stakes. The actors and actresses did a great job with what they had on the page. It’s just what was on the page to quote my British friends, “was a bit s%^t.”
Very well said.
I agree. I feel so sorry for the actors. They had nothing to make something of. You feel ashamed watching them. You understand how important a good script and a reasonably good director are.
I’ve never posted on Trek Movie. I’ve visited for years, I’ve read the discussions, I’ve agreed and disagreed. But this film was so soul crushing and mind numbingly bad, I had to post. With the success that is Strange New Worlds, most of Picard, Lower Decks, and Prodigy, I suppose they are excused the occasional disaster, and what an epic disaster it was. I’m going day drink now.
Just finished it. Painfully shallow, near non-existent characterization, horrible attempts at humor. The banter between the characters was distracting and annoying. Plenty of action, a lot of explosions and expected quips during, a lot of martial arts. A paint-by-the-numbers plot. The ‘story’ has been done 1,000 times before, and better. This isn’t just a bad ‘Trek’ movie or just a bad sci-fi movie, it’s simply a bad movie overall. Sadly, exactly what I would expect from these showrunners. It’s a shame too, because the cast looked like they were having fun with it. So glad this wasn’t made into a series. No value to Trek canon whatsoever, and very forgettable.
Easily something I will never, ever watch again.
I agree with you, it’s very much the worst thing I’ve ever seen on screen. It’s everything I dislike about modern Star Trek, modern culture, modern economics. This movie by all accounts should not exist, but the powers that be signed papers to make it so, and despite the outcry and the absolutely despicable results, here we are. Sad times indeed
Well, maybe not the *worst* thing ever seen on screen … S31 is just too insignificant for that. It’s a small, useless, sloppily cobbled together movie that will, hopefully, soon be forgotten.
I read statements on the net saying that Star Trek is dead by now. I hope the other series keep the franchise alive.
But the question will have to be asked whether the right decisions were made in the run-up to S31. Was it just to fulfill contracts?? … Or are they just not capable of making something better? Sometimes I have the sad idea that they wanted it exactly the way it is now: a gritty, irreverent, superficial mix of Star Trek, Suicide Squad and the remnants of tattered scripts that no one wants to make into a movie.
As a movie, I might rate it above the Star Wars Christmas special. That’s not saying much but maybe it is an honor to be compared. It is the worst movie of the Star Trek franchise though. Even the Star Wars Christmas special appeared to be Star Wars vs generic sci-fi.
“. . . and despite the outcry and the absolutely despicable results, here we are. Sad times indeed.” What were we talking about again? Oh, a movie.
I’m a life long Trekkie, I own props from previous shows, and have a whole room full of Trek paraphernalia (which my Wife is thrilled about). And I’m not fussed about this at all.
Of course I’ll watch it. Someday. Right now, I’m not signed up to P+, so I’ll wait until there’s something on there that I actually want to watch.
No matter what I think of it, I absolutely think everyone should watch for themselves.
Yeah, I just don’t want to be ‘that guy’ who hate watches stuff. It’s why I gave up on DSC midway through Season 4. I wish Star Trek could serve up stuff half as good as For All Mankind, or Foundation for example. It just seems to be playing to an ever more disillusioned fan base.
Oh, definitely don’t watch things you don’t enjoy! There’s no reason to do THAT.
What props do you have? I recently caught the collecting bug myself and I’m really happy with my acquisitions to date. In fact I just got a uniform off ebay last night.
Just some small bits, an isolinear chip from Generations. It’s acrylic with numbers printed on it. Stuff from the Kelvin movies is much cheaper, I have a turbo lift wall panel from Beyond. Probably my coolest thing is a painting done by Andrew Probert, which was the inspiration for the Ent-D
I rejoined P+ for it. Anything else I should be watching there so I don’t completely waste the $11 for a month?
The Agency has a good cast, so I’ll try it.
(BTW, I didn’t hate this movie – but it just felt like mildly-entertaining, mostly forgettable streaming filler. But it its certainly not the worst Trek ever made)
I love The Good Wife and The Good Fight. Elspeth and Matlock are fun. I think they might still have Smithsonian content so that was good.
They do still have Smithsonian content. I have been watching several of their nature documentaries, and they are very good
Thanks! I’m quite enjoying Matlock.
Plus you get Nicole de Boer in one episode and John Billingsley in another!
Well just watched and…yeah its not worth it. Sorry Kurtzman i think your time is done.
I wish. I also, frankly, never need to see anything else with the name Olatunde Osunsanmi on it.
Yeah i cant stand seeing his name as director.
I remember some of his Discovery episodes being alright, but I also recall that his style sometimes made it seem as if he thought he was five times the director he actually is. Here, that’s writ large. Poor, poor stuff.
We will read the name again. After all, he is the Exec at Academy. Sigh.
Comedies, a musical, and now B movies. What’s next for the name Star Trek?
I don’t want to think of it.
B is generous. It’s a C- on a good day.
D-movie is more accurate. B movies are bad but can be silly fun. This is just bad.
I look forward to hearing this episode of the podcast.
I just finished watching the movie, and am absolutely astonished by how bad it is. I expected to be appalled by it from a morality-of-Trek standpoint; I didn’t, somehow, expect it to be bad even at what it was *trying* to be. I think it might be the lamest episode of Star Trek ever produced. Worse than “Move Along Home,” or “Code of Honor,” or “Shades of Gray,” or “And the Children Shall Lead,” or literally anything else I can think of. Maybe there’s something so bad I’ve just blocked it out?
And to think, multiple people signed off on this. MANY people. All of them looked at the screenplay and said, “Absolutely, this is a viable path forward for the franchise, let’s do it!”
I just don’t even know what else to say. There will be people who like it, but hey, you can’t make a thing so bad that some people won’t enjoy it. My only positive feeling: that they only made a pilot (I refuse to call this a movie) and we got to avoid the series.
I always thought SUB ROSA was the worst Trek episode. But it’s not bad at all compared to S31.
I actually jumped out of the franchise altogether afterwards and did a rewatch of Star Wars: Rogue One to get the bad taste out of my mouth. It worked.
I don’t mind “Sub Rosa,” but I can’t honestly say I’m proud of that. lol
Would shout my love for it from the rooftops before watching “Section 31” again, though.
Career damaging. For those in front of and behind the camera.
I get that Kurtzman is desperate to remove the geek factor from Star Trek, but this movie was more cringe than cool. He really needs to make an effort to not damage the brand in the process of trying to replace what Star Trek is and the fan base for it.
I’m really glad this didn’t become a series, but it doesn’t work as a Star Trek movie either.
The negative reviews were accurate.
“I get that Kurtzman is desperate to remove the geek factor from Star Trek”
This never made sense to me. Why change the nature of Star Trek to increase it’s appeal to more demographics while at the same time you lose the very nature that makes it Star Trek?
My guess is that it all boils down to money and the amount that Paramount expects Star Trek to be making for them. Star Trek isn’t as popular as Marvel is and that seems to be the audience they are chasing. It’s only a brand to them.
They pretty much made Michael Burham an Avenger and the Section 31 movie seemed very derivative of Guardians/Suicide Squad. It’s obvious that they want to replace starship captains with superheroes.
“it all boils down to money and the amount that Paramount expects Star Trek to be making for them.”
That is certainly true. Star Trek Beyond was a pretty good movie and it had respectable box office results. But Paramount was disappointed: they wanted to make a lot more money with it.
They don’t understand it. They’re ruining it because they only see the money, because the people who are responsible for new projects only want the money. There’s no heart and soul left in the offices and all we can do is remember that Trek used to be really good. Brilliant in places.
Let’s remember the good. Let’s not let the incompetents in the management ruin it. There is enough to like. Prodgy, for example. SNW.
The S31 disaster should not ruin the fun of the idea that Gene put into the world: that there is a better, more humane future. Hopefully for our franchise too.
But wait…. let’s be fair… the on-screen text had a digital-glitch effect applied to it. So it HAD to be a cool movie, right?
Wow I didn’t absolutely hate it!!
I have really disliked the Emperor almost always but here it sort of set the right tone for that character. I hated her the least I have hated her. And I’m just gonna put it here that the final episodes of Discovery Season 2 and 3 and 4 ended their story lines much worse than this and so very sadly, Picard Season 2 was a travesty.
They also marketed this thing completely incorrectly and if they added about 5 minutes of character work they could have given us something more interesting for the trailers. I am astonished how badly they have marketed this!!
And someone must be on crack if they think anyone is going to enjoy this without knowing Star Trek or use this to get into Star Trek. Clearly someone behind the scenes had that argument and lost big time.
NOT how I would spend my $80 – this will not bring subscribers.
I didn’t hate it either. I even could see why they wanted to do a section 31 show. I liked the concept of the show in DS9 but since then not so much. It could have been a nice morally interesting action show. Unfortunately the movie didn’t quite live up to that in 90mins but I got where it could have gone.
I will say it wasn’t very “Star Trek.” However, on its own merits it was ok. I wasn’t particularly a fan of the Fuzz character. It was good in theory but I thought overall it just got more annoying as it went on. I wish they would have found time to give the characters more backstories. Also a few Easter eggs for fans wouldn’t have hurt. Overall the acting was pretty solid for what it was. So not as bad as I thought it would be given the trailers or the reviews.
I watch everything Star Trek and I have access to this. It just looks like a chore to watch, so I won’t. I hope others enjoy it. I am genuinely surprised at my lack of interest. I have enjoyed most of New Trek too.
To be brutally honest: I somewhat LIKED it. It wasn’t half as bad as I had expected. It wasn’t very good but decent enough: an entertaining, fun addition to the franchise.
BUT, and that makes it a typical Star Trek movie, it did suffer from the same problem that most Trek movies ahd since 1989… It was once again centered around a villain either craving for revenge, warmongering or eternal life. They are still chasing TWOK…
Other than that it was fine.
I found parts of it entertaining. I have loved Sam Richardson since Veep and his character made the overall movie tolerable for me. But for the most part I came away thinking we dodged a bullet that this was not a full series. What I tolerated for 90 minutes would have been excruciating for 10 hours or more…
I don’t know if it was the early negative reviews, but I found myself really enjoying this movie and regretting that we didn’t get a series with these characters! Call me surprised, I was expecting it to be an unwatchable slog, but instead it was fun, weird, energetic, and surprisingly grounded in Star Trek lore. It was an easy breezy movie that I found myself fully invested in. The cast is great, the characters are creative, and Michelle Yeoh was at her best with this character. Also some nice creative surprises for Star Trek that I really liked. The only thing that really failed for me was the incredibly obvious Mole reveal, the nonsensical MacGuffin, teleplay writing, and the weird campy cross genre cliche’s (Mission Impossible, Charlie’s Angel, etc.). But it’s one of those movies that overcomes its glaring weaknesses with style and fun. I know it won’t hold up in subsequent viewings, but in the moment I really enjoyed it. Also fantastic music, VFX, costume design, sets, ships, props, etc. It also looked and sounded phenomenal. Much of that superficiality and “feeling” really elevated the material for me, but I get why it falls epically flat for most. It’s just not nearly as artless as I was expecting.
I’m very happy you really enjoyed it Michael! I wanted to like it too, but yeah. I had a feeling I wasn’t going to, especially after reading the bad reviews but my expectations were set so low at this point, I figured I would like it a little more. Sadly even those expectations weren’t really met lol.
For example, everyone kept saying it was at least fun and it seems like you agreed with that too. Other than the underground platform chase and the fight scene in the night club, I thought a lot of it was pretty slow and boring. I just didn’t care who the mole was and the humor felt very forced and off brand (although I did laugh at a few jokes for sure). The production values were good though but it felt more like a TV pilot than a movie which it clearly was meant to be originally.
And this wasn’t a spy story at all. It was just a team up movie like Suicide Squad or GOTG which again the trailers emphasized a lot. It just felt so paint by numbers. There was no real intrigue for me. It was some guy who stole this deadly thing and they have to go stop him; but nothing that felt cloak and dagger about it at all. They keep describing it as Mission Impossible but MI actually use a lot of fun and creative spy tropes in their stories. This didn’t at all.
But it’s nice to see others liked it and we don’t all have to agree on everything. That’s why I come to places like this. I’m not looking for an echo chamber or being ‘right’, just people’s honest feelings, good or bad. But I think this is going to be a very divisive movie for a long long time lol.
I read all the bad reviews and absorbed every criticism in advance, expecting to reach the same conclusions. But instead I ran into surprising clarity in the script, even if it’s so compressed and most of it goes by in the blink of an eye with garbled dialogue. The biggest concern I had from the reviews was that the characters were under-developed and lacked motives, although I found way more in that regard than I expected and felt satisfied. I ended up turning on closed captioning and had to constantly replay scenes to understand the dialogue (probably why I felt invested because it was more work to follow along). I know if I was watching this in a theater without those resources, I probably would have been befuddled and unsatisfied. I found it quite fun and energetic, and some of the surprising character reveals really worked on me (especially Zeff). I wasn’t as weirded out by it as expected, probably because they fully committed to the absurdity and weirdness of everything. I finally understood the potential for a Section 31 show and now I miss it. I know I’m in the minority and that’s fine, but I use to be a Section 31 doubter. They really put together a great ensemble cast for a show and it ultimately felt wasted, which I find tragic.
Yeah I thought this was pretty bad. Just a lifeless and pretty banal ‘movie’ that just went through the motions with absolutely nothing to say and followed every cliche in the book and you wouldn’t have a clue it was even Star Trek.
Do I think this was the worst Trek project ever made, no, far from it. But do I think it was very poorly made with little reason to exist, yes, yes I do. I didn’t hate it and maybe in time if I ever decide to watch it again I will find more things to be positive about it, but all my fears after watching the trailers and listening to the director and others talk about it was confirmed in the movie. I just don’t even understand why this was made other than to bring Michelle Yeoh back?
It’s crazy to think this thing gestated for five years. It was talked about and debated endlessly if it will ever happen or not. And this is what we got?? The only thing that has been in development longer than this thing is Star Trek XIV, the DOA theatrical movie (which btw, its now been over a year that they announced the Starfleet origin movie and a year later have seen not a whiff of development since). Since clearly Paramount thinks making Trek films is now a suicide mission it was smart to just make less riskier (and clearly cheaper) streaming movies. But if they are going to be more like this, then don’t bother.
There were certainly things I liked. I actually thought the actors did a good job for what they were given. And I liked Quasi and Alok Shahar the most. They were really the only characters I would like to see again. But then they gave them these special traits with Quasi being a shape shifter and Alok being an augment and did jack all with them. What was the point of having a Chamaloid in a spy story and then doing absolutely nothing with it?? And the actress who played Rachel Garret was also good, but again, she could’ve just been anyone because they didn’t bother to develop her in any way. I always said I have no problem with having legacy characters showing up but A. It should make sense in the story it’s telling and B. Have a real reason for being there. I don’t think the movie justified either. Other than reminding us twenty times she’s part of Starfleet and goes by the book, it was a complete waste to even have her. I thought we were going to actually LEARN something about her. Why she felt she needed to be there. Her thoughts on Section 31. Something, anything.
But that’s the problem with the entire movie, there was no substance to any of it. It was the same Trek trope we seen a million times now, especially in modern Trek. Some villain wants vengeance and uses a bio weapon to exact his plan. He didn’t want to end all life in the galaxy (whew) but the Terran universe invading the prime was just as eye rolling. These big stakes just feel so empty now because it’s been done again and again and again. I think having a story wanting to just kill Georgiou would’ve been enough. And to call this ‘Section 31’ was more of a shrug because they gone so far away from the original concept it feels like gobbly gook now. It’s crazy that LDS handled the concept way better (and in a more creative way) than this movie ever did.
I’m not angry…just disappointed. If others enjoyed it, I’m very happy for them. But for me (and many many others) this was a pretty big misfire IMO. I get and understand they think the Star Trek fan base is getting too old and desperately trying to find something to appeal to anyone under 60 at this point. But if this is one of the ways to do it that it can’t even look or feel like Star Trek then what’s the point??
Just put the franchise on the back burner for awhile since Paramount clearly doesn’t see it as a main priority anymore. Let SNW play out to their natural conclusion and maybe SFA will capture this elusive audience. However if that doesn’t do it either just don’t make anything else for five years until they can figure out how to properly appeal the franchise to a younger audience and maybe come up with something wildly different detached from everything before. But if it’s going to be more stuff like this though, I certainly won’t be watching it.
“But if it’s going to be more stuff like this though, I certainly won’t be watching it”.
That’s the sad point. That so many won’t be interested any more.
I’m with you on the thought of just shelving the franchise for 5 or 10 years at this point, Tiger. With PRO and LDS done, finish up SNW and let new blood take a stab at it in the 2030’s.
Heck, personally I have enough Trek I consider great to happily rewatch for the rest of my life. Better than watching it get cheapened and beaten into the ground like this. What a sad state of affairs we’re in.
I just saw the movie. I was really amazed at how much these scenes drag on. How often you want to fast-forward (and you do) because everything doesn’t get going. Because sometimes it looks so clumsy. Because the lines and conversations are so unintelligent. But if you like a flashy sequence of scenes in which unlikeable characters punch each other in the face, you can like S31. If you’re not braindead, you’ll be bored and then quickly watch e v e r y other Star Trek movie as consolation.
But S31 can still serve as an example.
As an example of how to really screw it up.
I made it to, literally, 45:10. (Yes, I checked.) Not sure what kept me going that far, but that was all I could take. It was dreadful beyond belief. Not sure what else there is to say.
I just went through all of s1 of SEVERANCE and the first 2 eps of S2 in the last 60 hours, and believe me it is a mental palate cleanser. Though because I was on a cheesey80s action streak before that (48HRS, COMMANDO, RAW DEAL), I guess my palate needed cleansing anyway. So I’m not going to ruin the taste in my mouth by having to gag on this mess of a s31 flick.
Can you give me a comparison? LIke, the 45min you saw was as bad as Don Siegel’s TELEFON, or as bad as Arch Obler’s THE BUBBLE aka THE FANTASTIC INVASION OF PLANET EARTH? Or a totally forgettable movie called FLESHBURN (the latter two I actually saw in the theater, and walked out on FLESHBURN.)
I’m hoping you won’t compare it with the film adaptation of Fowles’ THE MAGUS, because I honestly enjoy watching that mess of a movie, and even own it on DVD (bought it from a 7-11 back in 2013.)
I was really hoping the advance reviews would be wrong. Hardcore Trek fans can be harsh.
But I just watched it, and I’m very glad to see apparently Tim Russ got to have another crowd-sourced fan-film produced.
Good lord. Why do they keep letting those 2 writers BY and EL author more TV. As soon as I saw the end-credits, I understood.
This isn’t Star Trek, it just isn’t. Who was this produced for? Tonight I watched what you produce when you want to further harm the franchise.
I understand Star Trek isn’t just supposed to be thought-provoking stories, and every iteration can’t be deep and meaningful.
But there is an established vernacular that works. And continually interjecting electric guitars, flaming comic relief bit-players, 21st-century buzzwords like “we’ve got the footage” and “on-brand” insults the history of the franchise and doesn’t make it “edgy” or modern.
Star Trek is about watching “the best of the best” solve a challenge. Not turning main characters into babbling idiots in the garbage disposal room. I’m not supposed to “relate” to characters on a pithy-dialog Gen-Z level.
The established Trek fan-base is not the minority. Whoever they are trying to “appeal” to now *are* the minority viewers.
It’s great to try something new or go in a new direction or tell a different tale in the established “universe”. But “this” wasn’t “that”.
A shame that the Trek-production world has reversed. Used to be amazing writing and some questionably rough visual FX.
Now it’s astounding production value and amazing visual effects trying to prop up first-semester screen writing out of the Humber College Film & TV program.
That’s my personal opinion. Maybe I’m in the minority? Maybe not.
Sure, long-time fans like to defend drivel like this by citing questionable episodes of Trek from the past. But I’d like to mention that was back when they were churning out 26 episodes a year, and sometimes over 50 episodes in a season over simultaneous shows on the same lot. So yes, there were lots of cringy filler episodes.
That’s not an excuse or a comparison. This was a singular well-funded and long-planned TV movie.
Hold onto your hats, because this might be a big foreshadowing to Starfleet Academy.
One would at least hope that the level of talent attracted by ACADEMY suggests a belief on some level that the material is at least decent, but Giamatti has been in a fair number of stinkers in his time, plus his fan status also could dilute his judgement. With Hunter, except for a short-lived series in the teens, she has basically been doing voice work for most of the last 15 years, so I assume she may have fallen prey to the ‘aging out of work’ that many great actresses face.
Actually, the more I think about it, the less faith I have that ACADEMY will be any good.
I have never posted before on this site, but I’ve been a reader for a very long time! I always enjoy the discussions and agree or disagree with what I read, but I almost always learn something. But today, I thought I’d post. In retrospect, I should have posted about things I’ve liked before this, so my first post isn’t negative, but well here we are.
I like most of the new shows, Discovery being my least favorite, but still with a number of good episodes. But this “movie” just made me… sad. It makes Nemesis seem like a masterpiece. I knew I wasn’t going to love it. I just didn’t realize how bad it was going to be in so many ways! There were some cool ideas here and there, but mostly…. well, I won’t rehash all the criticisms that have been made. It’s not on my rewatch list, that’s for sure. I just don’t understand so many of the decisions that were made that allowed this to be made….
Welcome Beastman, and agreed – it does make Nemesis look pretty good. For me it was like when Discovery came out, I was so disappointed after two seasons I quit it and went back and watched Enterprise again, which come to find out was a pretty awesome show in comparison. To me this film was not indicative of Star Trek in any way, pretty much as shallow and plastic as I thought it would be. It’s a shame what the franchise has been reduced to. Cheers. 🍻
I think I generally agree with the content of this podcast. I am one of those that any Trek is good Trek, even bad Trek is good Trek, because it is better than the alternative of no Trek. I think they would have been better off scrapping the entire initial batch of scripts and start over as a streaming movie script. I do think the concept of a streaming movie can work really well for Trek, so I hope that Paramount sees this as a challenge to overcome, instead of running away from it.
Personally, there were some positive elements in the movie, and also downsides. Cramming 10 hours of story into 90 minutes of story hurt the overall story in this movie. Loved Michelle Yeoh, of course. There are parts that I genuinely liked. The props and fight choreography. I thought the back story of Georgiou was interesting. I liked the garbage scow. I especially liked how she kicks the machine to get it running. Percussive Maintenance! Jankom Pog approves!
“Section 31” shoves Star Trek aside, all to give us a lame riff on other, better action films.
I didn’t outright hate it, but it’s like a poorly-made Tzartak aperitif; it fizzles away, leaving nothing of note behind.
Yeoh does what she can with the script, but even she can’t save the movie from all its flaws.
It doesn’t even have fun action! I didn’t know it was possible to make a fight scene with MICHELLE YEOH boring. And that tunnel chase…just awful.
I’m going to disagree that everyone should watch it and make up their own mind. There is nothing I’ve seen or read about this that makes me want to give it any of my time. Your pod about it is damning with faint praise. Thanks for watching it so I don’t have to. I’ve got Paramount+ snoozed right now. Unsnoozing it will just encourage them.
I prefer The Shuttle Pod because they don’t carry water for Secret Hideout. I miss those folks.
This comment stuns me – all four of us on this podcast gave the movie a negative review. How is that carrying water for Secret Hideout?
This podcast doesn’t critique or scrutinize this production studio enough. Star Trek as a brand has suffered significant damage in recent years, as evidenced by the numbers, but the podcast remains overly measured and fails to address the extent of this decline. While I acknowledge this is just my opinion and may not reflect the views of others who enjoy the current direction, I personally found catharsis in listening to The Shuttlepod, where the criticism was more direct. In contrast, this podcast feels apologetic to me. Even though none of you liked this particular show, I worry that discussing it in such a restrained way lends legitimacy to creators who, in my view, have consistently mishandled the franchise for nearly a decade. Perhaps I’m being too harsh, but I simply want to see Star Trek move forward competently. It’s been a long and frustrating period.
My thoughts on Section 31:
Nobody wants to make a bad entertainment/movie/series etc.; I assume they tried with their best intent according to their tastes.
Nevertheless, WTH was that?
I assume that S31 has suffered due to change from a series to a condensed TV movie.
Perhaps, they tried to compensate with fast cuts and occasional over the top acting for a generic and somewhat a dull plot, bad writing/science (her foot stuck in wall, she can’t unstuck it but is not hurt afterwards… would not her foot phase with the wall, something akin to a TNG episode referenced in TrekCulture overview of gruesome deaths; not a plausible science-fiction but rather a science-magic, something once sees in ST more often past the Kelvin reboot [*])
Or may be, S31 was supposed to be a lighthearted action TV
seriesmovie with intentional… well silliness… winking to the audience (something “Moonlightning” TV series with B. Willis did in crimi/comedy/drama effectively) – Don’t take it too seriously, ’cause we don’t too; it’s supposed to be colorful fast-paced (Mission Impossible style) fun that happens to be set in the world of Star Trek, nothing more.I did not see it advertised as that; did I miss that?
I appreciate *occasional* Star Trek romps, I do.
On average, I really do expect more – though challenging *believable* science-fiction allegory dealing with topics/issues of human existence through its characters.
[*] miracle serum from augment’s blood, ultra-distance transporters making traveling by ships unnecessarily slow as hinted at by HISHE, or was it ScreenJunkies?, in their YouTube video about Star Trek: Into Darkness; miracle serum to convert other humanoid races to Vulcan(oid)s in upcoming ST:SNW season’s episode (then one can wonder why they used prosthetics instead of similar sera in more advanced ST:TNG).
Who’s this for?
Hunger Games fans who want to see Michelle Yeoh eating eyeballs?
Or Guardians of the Galaxy/suicide Squad, heist fans etc?
I can’t really see what the draw would be.
Oh, damn. Had completely forgotten that she eats eyeballs in the movie. What a work of art, sigh.
I enjoyed it. I wasn’t blown away by it, and could quibble with a few of the story and production choices, but I found it a satisfying enough entry into the franchise. (For comparison’s sake, I would rate this above Star Trek V and Nemesis.)
Unfortunately, the plethora of negative reviews will be what the majority of non-Trek fans will be aware of. That will hurt the franchise more than the actual film itself.
Some people seem to be ripping on a lack of development or depth of the supporting characters, but I didn’t expect a lot of that in an introductory movie with a cast that large. Same goes for the story – they weren’t going to go much deeper than backstory for Philippa Georgiou, since Michelle Yeoh is the draw for new viewers.
It didn’t lean too hard into the amoral nature of Section 31 as seen on DS9 or Discovery, so to me it felt more like an undercover task force than a black-ops band of soulless mercenaries.
That said, if you hate the very notion of Section 31, this won’t change your mind. You shouldn’t be surprised if you don’t like it. It’s okay, but please spare the world any “It’s not Gene Roddenberry’s Star Trek” diatribes. You may be right, but at this point it’s not a shocker.
I didn’t think there was much (other than Rachel Garrett) to firmly plant it between the TOS and TNG eras. But that was likely deliberate, so as to not distract viewers new to Trek. Those viewers didn’t need to know the stardate in order to follow the story, and we fans didn’t need to dwell on it too much, either.
Positive points – It seemed clear the actors were having fun. It also looked grand, so Paramount didn’t go cheap on the budget.
The time spent on the Terran Empire years did a good job conveying the depth to which Philippa was forced to go in order to survive and become emperor. It provided a good contrast to where we last saw her on Discovery, even beyond the direct connection to events of the story.
And I’ll admit I really enjoyed the little cameo.
Wishes: As long as they were going to summarize Georgiou’s Discovery backstory, I would’ve liked to see a little bit on when and where she landed when she came back from the future, and more than just a hint of how she came to be running a bar outside the Federation.
The sound seemed a bit muddled, but I find that modern directors and sound designers have swung away from ensuring actors actually speak up and enunciate. I think the result is considered a substitute for actual nuance, but… speak up, dammit!
Skydance only knows if we’ll see any more of this corner of the Star Trek mythos, but if an Oscar-winner like Michelle Yeoh wants to do it (and bring along her friend) I’d be surprised if Paramount would say “no” – particularly if they believed in the premise enough to make this movie.
Well a celebration is in order!!!!! I didn’t think it would ever happen but after 22 years, they have finally made a movie I think is worse than Nemesis! It took a lot of hard work to get here (and STID came pretty close too but still came just above it) but they finally found a way to make something even worse in almost every way possible.
Yeah this sucked donkey balls. I’m obviously not surprised because most of us knew it was going to be bad based on the horrible trailers alone, but I didn’t know how bad until I sat and watched it. And maybe I was the only one, but I really wanted San to win lol.. Adolf made his life miserable, I can’t fault the guy at all. She’s a horrible human being and this movie didn’t change that for me at all. I mean she killed her own family. And I liked how the movie started with that depressing scene but then it ended like some sitcom with everyone in their party gear joking around with Adolf like they are some family unit now and she’s now the mother hen of the group. It starts out as Schindler’s List, it ends like an episode of Friends with a lot of bad team up and spy cliches to complete the middle. Man, this was horrible.
There were some things I liked but overall just bad. Why even call this Section 31? There was no espionage in this movie. All the ‘characters’ just stood around and gave their back stories. It looked as cheap and generic as the trailers made it seem. I see a lot of people saying this felt like a TV pilot, which it basically was. Just thankfully we will only see the pilot to this dreck. This movie ended on a Your Mama joke. Seriously guys?
But others seem to like it at least a little more than I did and good for them. At least someone enjoyed it. I definitely didn’t outside of a few moments. And they didn’t ruin Rachel Garret, so that’s a bonus at least although I have no idea why she was even in this?
Maybe I will have more to say later but overall I give this dreck a 2/10. If San killed Georgiou it could’ve gotten a 4/10.
Latest Rotten Tomatoes score.
It’s a dismal 18% audience score but fortunately the critical scores are a much more positive 23% and currently tied with The Final Frontier!
This thing now has a lower audience score than Discovery which has a 33% compared to this drek!
Congrats Kurtzman you finally manage to make something that is hated more than Discovery! 😂🙄
I went into this really wanting to give it a chance and like it since it’s the only new Trek we’ll have until SNW season 3 comes our way, and it’s the franchise’s first venture into a TV movie. After watching though, it I was more disappointed than anything. I agree with what most people have said here that it feels more like a generic undercover caper movie vs. a Section 31 adventure. I also think it suffered A LOT from being transformed from a full season to a 90-minute movie. You could clearly see where they were planning on doing more with the characters but couldn’t given the time constraints.
One thing took me out of the moment immediately as I started watching was the stardate. I know that like starship registry numbers, stardates have a tendency to be a little inconsistent, but since we knew this was taking place at some point in the early 24th century, there were plenty of reference points to use. Setting this on stardate 1292.4 puts it before Strange New Worlds. When I saw that pop up, I thought that maybe they were going to start in the past, then jump into the future somehow, but I feel like they just blew it with the date, which was a bad way to start. A quick search on Memory Alpha (which I know Trek writers have used in the past) would have given them what they needed to get the date right:
Strange New Worlds S2E10 Hegemony: 2344.2
Enterprise-B Launch: 9715.5 (2293)
Enterprise-D Launch: 40759.5 (2363)
The date should have been somewhere between the launches of the B and the D, probably around the 15,000’s.
Not sure how or why they came up with 1292.4. Maybe someone put the decimal in the wrong place. Either way, seeing this major error in the opening moments of the movie immediately made me start wondering what else they were going to get wrong. Unfortunately it was a sign of things to come.
I think if they did this as a full season, it would have been much better. We would have gotten to learn about the characters and their backstories and understand their motivations for joining 31. They could even have done a full season with them going on adventures as a group and introduced Georgiou at the end as a setup for season 2 to accommodate Michelle Yeoh’s schedule.
Overall this was a missed opportunity and I hope it doesn’t affect the ability to bring more Trek to our screens in the future.