Posted 27 August 2013 - 07:02 PM
You only have to look at the past 50 years of Star Trek to know that the world, and society has changed, TNG is wildly different in tone and story-telling than TOS was, DS9 is a radical departure from TNG and now we have Abrams Trek which is a departure from all of the previous incarnations - the world might still be a terrible place, full of the terrible things but I can't agree with the opinion that we are living in the same society as we were in the 60's. Hell I'm 28 and even I can see how much the world has changed from when I was a young teenager, the explosion of rolling news, social media has had a huge impact in the way people communicate with each other. The way we fight wars has changed too from even Vietnam or the first Gulf-War. Technology has had a huge impact in not just our personal lives, but the way the human race lives, how can anyone here say that the world is the same place as it was in 2001 let alone 1966.
We may face the same challenges as the world did in 1966 but its how we deal with those challenges that has ultimately changed and art, entertainment, Star Trek has indeed reflected that,
Your intent Wirlygig, on changing the subject just won't work since I was not talking about originality of story or story specifics or even of Into Darkness primarily. I think my opinion was pretty clear to begin with, people's outlook in this world has changed, we can tell this by looking at how we live our lives now compared to how we were living our lives in the 60's, society has changed, for better or for worse regardless, that will indeed change the way we think and thus change the way artists paint, writers, write, directors direct and ultimately influence the people charged with creating Star Trek - the people making it and the people running it. Star Trek needed to change too, In 1982 it did it with Wrath of Khan, in 1987 it did it with TNG, in 1993 it did it with DS9, in 2001 it did it with Enterprise and in 2009 it did it with "Star Trek", it did in whatever way it needed to end of... so VF replied... But it's not Star Trek!!! Well film and TV are all subjective so think what you like but as a business, Trek was dead before Abrams came along and ultimately, 50 years on from the original, Star Trek is not just one TV series that changed the world anymore, it is a franchise, and whilst a franchise rich with history, exploration of not just space but ideas and the human condition, it has and will always exist only to make more money off of it's fans and potential new fans, what people take from the series past, present and future is again, subjective to that individual and there's no doubt that any new Star Trek movie or TV series will continue to embrace the era in which it is created in... that's all I was saying.
What I took from Star Trek Into Darkness was personal to me, I lost my father to cancer a few years ago and both the 2009 movie and Into Darkness and especially Chris Pine's Kirk, made me come to terms with my own feelings and to accept that no matter what you loose in life no matter how much you feel hopeless and helpless, no matter how far you sink or how much you cock up, as long as you believe in your own abilities and remain dedicated to your passions in life, you will not only surprise yourself but you will live up to your fathers name, to my dad's name, to Captain Pike's name... But look, there are messages in everything so I think everyone is going to see something different if they look for it (If you're going in already hating the idea of an alternate timeline then you're not likely to see anything but the wiz bang) when they watch a movie like any of the Trek movies and really most of the TV epsiode's too. So besides taking something personal from the two Abrams movies I can't say I've taken much of a general message from any of the Star Trek movies. Can people honestly say they took a lot of deep and meaningful messages from Wrath of Khan? Of course not. With every Star Trek movie, their emphasis is on friendships, emotions. Into Darkness, Insurrection, The Voyage Home and The Undiscovered Country are the few Trek movies who've commented on social and ethical dilemmas in a more direct way. Into Darkness commentated on whether or not it was right to start a war before one begun? It seemed as though we saw an Admiral intent on preserving peace at any cost (George W Bush?) acting on emotion rather than rational thinking after a brutal attack that destroyed Vulcan. And then you had the USS Vengeance (on the nose) and designing and preparing to go to war by launching unmanned drone attacks on a possible enemy (the Klingons) and using dictators (Khan) to do our bidding, only to have them turn on us and asking the very controversial question, do these dictators have a point in being pissed off? Dictators who were given everything by the west (Marcus) only to have it taken away from them when they became too powerful or too much of a risk? And even worse, sending our troops (The Enterprise) into the danger zone to hunt down and kill this dictator at any cost (sabotaging the Enterprise to incite war with the Klingons...)
But besides all of that, it was a Star Trek story, great action, great acting and a message there if you wanted to see it, and that's a reality of all film, old Trek or Abrams Trek, it is all subjective.
