Space: The New, Final, Different Frontier

The last movie I saw with my dad was Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the live action one from some years ago. I really enjoyed it. He most likely didn't. Well, 19 years has passed since then (holy shit) and finally we got to go see a movie that we both loved!

I've been skeptical since the start on this one but man, did the geek in me like this movie. There is a 4-part comic book prequel to this film which I highly highly highly recommend reading before seeing the movie. It fleshes out lots of background story and also familiarizes you with Leonard Nimoy's Spock and his current political and social situation (any Next Generation fan will be pleased), as well as what the heck is going on in the 1st scene of the movie since the comic literally ends the moment the movie begins.

I'm a very casual Trek fan, I know enough to get by and could easily convince non-Trekkies that I am a Trekkie with my minimal knowledge of that universe. The best part of this film is the overall idea that it brings a new standard of rebooting a franchise for tv and film. It's nothing new to comic book readers, as reboots, retcons and revamps are just a part of everyday lore (and often, frustration).

A quick plot synopsis is that Old Spock was setting out to prevent the destruction of Romulus, having promised the Romulans he would do so. Nero, the captain of a simple mining ship was rushing home to save his pregnant wife, only to arrive just in time to see Old Spock fail as the planet is destroyed leaving them the only local survivors. Old Spock's attempt to quell a supernova blast was to inject it with 'red matter', creating a singularity (black hole) and eating the energy blast. Well, his timing was a little off because the planet died and a singularity ended up sucking up Nero and Old Spock into a time warp...and that's when the movie begins.

So, in a way, this movie takes place in Next Generation time because Old Spock and Nero are both from the current continuity we all know so far. The beautiful thing that happens in this movie is that Nero and Old Spock existing in the past creates a new timeline which we now follow...keeping the old Star Trek timeline fully intact! Everything that happened happened but now Nero and Old Spock are trapped in this new timeline they've created and everything we know and love still gets to exist but it all comes about in a different way in this new timeline! Confused? Then you don't read enough comic books!

This movie is a very in-your-face setup for a series of films and the characters can go anywhere from here. They're all aware the timeline was altered and they already lived an adventurous life and made their place in history, however, they're also aware that that history will co-exist along another timeline and they're now free to set a new destiny for themselves in this newly born timeline. If that's not kick-ass cool then I don't know what is. This is the first time this kind of mind-fucking continuity is being layed out on a major film franchise and I think it's awesome.