To help contribute, here’s the only meme I’ve ever done, which I did in response to news that Abrams was working on a new ST movie. And after seeing how well the franchise is going with SNW and LD, I feel it’s even more appropriate.
The films really weren’t that bad
They were very typical “J.J. Abram’s has no idea what a franchise is actually about”. He actually admitted not having seen any extra materials about the franchise before making the movies, and rehashed existing storylines because it’s safe.
JJ Abrams is loved by the studios for the very same reasons he’s dreaded by the fans.
Yep. I liked them. Movie Trek has always been action anyways. He did some shit I really enjoyed honestly. Like Kirk being a rocker totally fucking fits.
I also don’t want Rian Johnson or Kathleen Kennedy anywhere near Star Wars or Star Trek anymore. Can we add them to the list as well.
I’d be happy if Rian Johnson got another chance with Star Wars. Brick, Brothers Bloom, Looper, and Knives Out were all great and at least personally The Last Jedi felt like it was trying to set up things to pay off in the next movie since he was originally slated to write and direct Episode 8 and 9.
You’re entitled to your opinion, but I certainly don’t share it. I literally hate every single thing about it. It is the most disappointed I have ever been leaving a movie.
I left it absolutely invigorated and optimistic for the franchise. I saw it had some flaws, with one sizeable one being that it should have ignored the cliffhanger in TFA and caught up 6-12 months later*; the OT (and less successfully, the PT) got to handwave a LOT of character development by simply letting life happen offscreen. Still, TLJ took a needlessly derivative setup from TFA and set the stage for a much more interesting Episode Nine than we got, and I utterly disagree that he didn’t get or like Star Wars. Shit, Rian Johnson is the only one who was willing to SAY the words “Darth Sidious.”
I thought he gave a thoughtful fan’s perspective on what Star Wars needs to be to remain relevant, the theme of growing from failure being particularly well done for a big popcorn franchise. The scene with Rose’s sister, the Yoda scene, the acting from Adam Driver after the throne room scene? All peak Star Wars IMHO. Then of course TROS came along and was so clumsy and petty in how it blew up Rian Johnson’s new directions, and so generally messy, that it didn’t even please the people who hated TLJ.
TFA was useful as a palate cleanser for the generation who rejected the PT, and it gave us a compelling new batch of heroes and villains (Snoke honestly being the least interesting as a character), but it didn’t really DO much, and its worldbuilding was absolutely retrograde. TLJ was a needed course correction, but Disney not only recoiled from the backlash, but took all the wrong lessons from it even if it did need to affect the direction of Ep9. JJ was, in the end, very wrong for Star Wars, though if TFA was his only one, it might not have been so obvious.
*-Two others being the framing device of the “slow speed chase” and Finn’s arc being such a minor step forward . A few tweaks to the technobabble or moving them to Crait earlier and having it be a bit more of a formidable facility could have helped the first one, and having Finn more explicitly trying to save Rey and Poe at the cost of the Resistance might have better highlighted the additional layer of growth RJ was thought he still needed.
He dove right in and I think got the point. The only thing I don’t like about the JJ Abrams films are the aesthetics. It’s a funky mix of the original style, but “how it would have looked if TOS had money.” They should have made it look as hokey as the original, IMO. It’s fun watching through now and noticing how this material that doesn’t actually exist is totally just some plywood painted gray.
I don’t mind the Kelvin movies too much. Actively enjoy them for the most part. But JJ was definitely the worst part of those movies by far and I completely agree with the meme. You can feel the love of everyone bleeding through despite him, not because of him. So many people worked on those movies who were huge fans of Trek and then he has the nerve to openly talk about how he isn’t a fan of Star Trek.
Beyond is my favorite of the Kelvin movies and, what do you know, JJ didn’t direct it. Funny that.
The man knows how to absolutely decimate a Starfleet vessel. I’m all for bringing him back if he’s just limited to 10 minutes of an unpowered ship tumbling in free fall towards a planet.
Strange New Worlds is much better modern Star Trek, but you can’t say JJ didn’t take advantage of the theatrical scale of things.
Oh absolutely. Visually those movies are stunning. Like yeah, you can argue about plot and what not all you want but the shots of Into Darkness of the Vengeance sliding across San Francisco? Absolutely fucking amazing. And that shot of the Enterprise on a death spiral through the sky before the camera stops and you see the Enterprise slowly rise through the clouds? I have goosebumps thinking about it. I’m gonna need to rewatch that scene again.
Beyond has one of my favorite ship destruction sequences in all of Star Trek. Just the glory of the Enterprise cruising through space before having its throat unceremoniously slit was… Honestly it was a gut punch. Then seeing the saucer section bashing through mountains before crashing to a stop? FUCK! Not to mention the follow-up scene of reactivating the thrusters and causing the saucer to flip over.
Honestly the visuals are a huge reason as to why I enjoy the movie so much.
I didn’t hate the Kelvin movies, aesthetically though they were trash in that they took a scifi franchise known for inspiring good UI design and expanded upon it with absolutely horrendous UI. Seriously the computers and interiors of those ships are so ugly it hurts.
Also, starfleet felt WAYYYYYYY too much like a military for me in those movies, there was no attempt to differentiate starfleet from a direct analog to the U.S. military and that just gives me that “kind of want to throw up” feeling every time I see it in star trek.
The part about the visuals of the ships is mostly opinion. I don’t think they’re that ugly.
I mean… there are a lot of differences that separate Starfleet from the US Military. That seems like a bit much. However the militaristic thing in general is completely explained in universe. It’s not just a “Oh, Starfleet is more of a military now!” thing. The Kelvin was rocking along, doing it’s typical stuff, and then suddenly a massive warship with unheard of weaponry shows up and proceeds to obliterate it, killing a massive amount of people and forcing over 800 other people to run for their lives. All in no time at all and within Federation borders. Prime Timeline Starfleet beefed up the military aspect after the Borg and only increased due to the Dominion. Makes a lot of sense to me that they’d step up the militaristic aspect in a universe where a random incursion within their own borders left them completely defenseless. Then 20ish years later, the fleet that was sitting at Earth and is responsible for Earths defense is completely wiped out in less than 10 minutes by that same ship. At that point it would be absolutely idiotic to not have Starfleet be more militaristic.
We’re not going to include JJ’s most ‘successful’ protégée, are we? *cough
