Escapism

As a young Junior high boy in the mid-sixties (that's 1960's, not 1860's!) I and my fellows watched the original "Star Trek" T.V. series.

Set in the 23rd Century, we liked it because of the characters, the 'Space Western' Plots, and the portrayal of a humanity that survived the Atomic Cold war era we were living in.

And perhaps the short skirt uniforms that the female crew members of the Enterprise and the Alien races wore had something to do with it.

The cheesey special effects, complete with plastic space ship models hanging by sometimes visable wires and the hammy over acting of Bill Shatner did not dull our devotion.

The movies which revived the franchise and subsequent sequel/prequel T.V. series never quite captured the original intent, movie two "The Wrath of Kahn" being the only exception.

All attempts in recent years of going back to the sixties, "Mission Impossible" "Bourne" "Wild Wild West" etc have been major failures for the most part.

Last weekend we saw the much anticipated "Star Trek" which takes the original crew back to their academy days and their first mission together on the brand spanking new NCC-1701 Starship Enterprise.

And Wow, what a great summer blockbuster ride at warp speed it is!

Even if one has no familiarity with the genre', this is a great Sci-Fi action adventure flick!

From the opening sequence where the Evil rogue Romulan Nero attacks and destroys the Starship Kelvin, briefly and heroically commanded by James T. Kirk's father George, to the final confrontation between Jim Kirk and the Enterprise and Nero, the pace never slackens.

The plot depends on a time travel basis, convoluted at best.
Many of the givens you old timers are familiar with are different, from Captain Christopher Pike's first command of the Enterprise to Kirk losing his father at birth.

Even one of the old cast reprises his role as a very old man who travels back in time to aid his old friends (and himself, according to Einstein an impossibility)

The special effects are quite spectacular, but what makes this movie so enjoyable are the characterizations of all too familiar figures.
Casting is superb, from Winona Ryder and Ben Cross's portrayal of Spock's parents, to Simon Pegg's hysterical Montgomery Scott, "Scotty", always my favorite character.

Chris Pine is perfectly cast as a young, bitter impetuous James Tiberious Kirk (the origin of that awful middle name is revealed in the first sequence) Zach Quinto is excellent as the young Spock, and Leonard "Bones" McCoy quickly became my favorite in this movie.

After delivering a diatribe about all of the horrible things that can happen to a person who travels through space (a recurrent theme for McCoy in the original) to Kirk, Kirk replies "But we're joining Star Fleet. They kind of operate in space!"
McCoy reveals a great deal about his cranky nature "My ex-wife took the whole D*** planet in the divorce. Space is as far from her as I can get!"

And we finally learn Uhura's first name. I won't spoil it here.

Nods are given to the old school Trekkers.
On a beautiful hi-tech bridge, the "throttle" for the Warp Drive looks like a stick shift from a 1968 Mustang.
The engineering section could be a boiler plant in present day Iowa, and the ship was built on Earth in a traditional looking ship yard.

Realism is more apparent, shuttle craft actually have visable chipped paint from heat, and ships must calculate and "pop out" of warp drive at a planned destination, flying blind for the most part in route.

This tries to address to some degree knowledge gained about Quantum Physics since the original.

But this is after all, Science Fiction, and escapist entertainment at it's best.

Spend the eight bucks and sit back and enjoy the ride!