OR How I LEarned to Stop Worrying and Love the JJ Team's Rebootverse, including Star Trek Into Darkness
I originally posted this all to fiercynn's dreamwidth (which was a total bombardment, as I don't know even know her, except via some good Star Trek Into Darkness fic recs she just posted) in response to a post she wrote about how she actually really loved Star Trek Into Darkness, despite the negativity coming from some parts of fandom. To that, this spilled out of me, and it basically sums it up. This must be dear to my heart as I haven't come out of lurkdom in at least a year or two... I'd seriously love to know everyone's thoughts, so please comment back. So, to her admitting her love of Star Trek Into Darkness, I wrote back:
I feel totally the same. I just want to tell you that.
Meaning that I've been a TOS fan for years -- and DS9, TNG, etc. -- and at first for just two breaths, don't judge me, I hated the 2009 movie (simply because I'd lived in the original verse for so long, I was too much of a total purist for a second -- as I can tend to be for all of a month or so before I finally get the magic of a new great interpretation, like with Jackson's LotR at first as well, but now the Reboot and Jackson's LotR and BBC Sherlock, etc., are additions to my fannish soul, instead of hates -- except the SW prequels which I still *hate*). Anyway, soon after seeing Star Trek 2009, I did come around (in part thanks to seeing it through the eyes of a good friend who was not a TOS fan but loved the Reboot), and I have loved the Rebootverse ever since and lived in it for the last three or so years of fic and Pinto (I mean, just scroll back through whitelaws' tumblr a few pages, I mean) and waiting... So I was waiting for STID in some form for a long time.
And. I just. totally. loved it.
sure, I have huge nitpicks. sure, they took me a moment to overcome, but on same base level still, I'm just gleeful. As New York Magazine's David Edelstein put it in his spot-on (Trekkie-angled) review of the first movie (which got a slightly higher 'fresh' rating on rottentomatoes than STID, yes, for real reasons even so): "Yet there are other, transcendent moments—time-benders. Suddenly, I found myself back in the days when I (and you?) enacted Star Trek in the basement... If you care about this universe (and I do, damn it), you won’t sit passively through J.J. Abrams’s restart Trek. You’ll marvel at the smarts and wince at the senselessness. You’ll nitpick it to death and thrill to it anyway." (italics mine)
yes, a lot of the meta/devastating critiques people have come out with actually are right -- like yes, A. O. Scott (whom I really do respect at the NYTimes), the philosophical optimism of the original is majorly dimmed in some ways from its 1966 glory; yes, Carol Marcus didn't actually do anything, and I so wanted her to, especially in a movie from the year 2013 that I love, which doesn't even manage to pass the Bechdel test -- and also because the original Carol was quite kickass in her way; and no, they didn't go on a new adventure, and the adventure they went on didn't actually make a ton of real sense (why did Khan try to smuggle his crew/family out in the torpedoes he made again? how was he going to accomplish doing that with 72 tubes? for a supposed genuine genius/superhuman, i can't see how that was ever going to work), but a lot of stuff that people also hated, I actually liked a lot. Like, yes, whitewashing is a serious and heinous problem in Hollywood but somehow I forgave them because Benedict Cumberbatch was great? And Uhura and Spock were played well and their relationship was actually explored (though I do worry that in the third film they're actually going to get them hitched, since how else can they avoid it when they're two mature, intelligent people who have some real affection for each other *and* one of them must mate every 7 years or die? like, even though Spock romantically loved/will love Kirk more (even according to Gene's admission), how is he not going to end up with Uhura for life in this 'verse? i mean, first of all, they're genuinely starting to make it half believable, damn and praise them for loving Uhura. and second, lives have turned out thwarted that way for eons...closeted and non-closeted lives both, ending up with nice, good people that aren't quite right...and they're already doing pon farr for spock while he's still with uhura in the comics post-STID... so that could suck).
but ANYWAY, I actually loved it.
I even thought the rewrite of TWoK was genuine genius because as soon as you get over the almost too-jarring parallels and see it instead on the level of this new universe, it's immensely moving, in fact, that all those moments in fact repeat themselves, even down to particular lines that make sense in both places (see: "better get down here, better hurry" and "you'll flood the whole compartment") with variations on a theme. It's like: destiny in some way cannot be avoided, i.e. one of them was always going to have to come to grief on the other side of that glass wall, unable to touch the other. And this time, though, they did what the other would do, instead of what they themselves would've done... in part because Spock Prime was able to speak to nu!Spock and acknowledge what happened the first time, that they paid a heavy price the first time around... And just. Like, the haters also rightly say that they put Leonard!Spock in the movie for 'fanservice,' and they totally did on the one hand, but on the other, it totally moves me to shit for real reasons that I think the writers actually, genuinely intended: like, when nu!Spock is like, "Did you defeat him?" and Leonard!Spock looks down and says something like..."Yes, in the end...at great cost." and you're like Jfkdjakfljaldf@!!! The cost was that you died!!! watch out nu!Enterprise!crew nooooo
which is why this is my favorite post-STID fic so far, by trinityofone, cause it's about some of these inevitable parallels between the 'verses and Spock Prime's ultimate witnessing of them and sharing them with nu!Jim. The Reboot!verse is just poetic and good in this way -- that these iconic figures have certain destinies. myths are like that That's way Spock Prime even refers to 'destinies' to both Jim and his younger self. "I could not deprive you of all that..." "That is not my destiny."
So when Scotty calls up to Spock on the bridge in STID and is like, "You better get down here--- better hurry," I'm like dying, and it was all paid off for me. Because it was a fate they couldn't avoid -- and watching Jim silently punch that warp core connection back into place with these hard pounding sounds of his feet...with no music, just as in TWOk.. and then Spock do that silent, desperate run down the halls as Bill Shatner did three decades ago...
it made so much sense.
also, it didn't just jive with old-verse TOS and the Prime Spock and Kirks destinies. it jived with nu!verse themes as well: see 2009 Reboot movie key scene (which of course is also an homage to TWoK):
Spock: You of all people should know, Cadet Kirk. A captain cannot cheat death. Kirk: I of all people? Spock: Your father, Lieutenant George Kirk, assumed command of his vessel before being killed in action, did he not? Kirk: [defensively] I don't think you like the fact that I beat your test... Spock: Furthermore, you have failed to divine the purpose of the test. Kirk: [seething with anger] Enlighten me again. Spock: The purpose is to experience fear. Fear in the face of certain death. To accept that fear, and maintain control of oneself and one's crew. This is a quality expected in every Starfleet captain.
and then in STID, Kirk faces fear in the face of certain death, literally saying, "Spock, I'm scared," maintains control so well that he saves everyone's life, as well as the ship, and then dies.
and then his resurrection scene is a purposeful (perhaps?) echo of the TMP sickbay hand-holding scene but again one where their two roles are reversed-- and Jim is in recovery, not Spock.
And further, the detractors keep saying that the STID warp core scene wasn't earned by the characters, but I argue that the emotional payoff of that scene is intentionally of a different nature in STID than it was in TWOK for this reason: everyone is of course saying that STID is a remake of both the movie TWOK and the episode Space Seed, but ACTUALLY what no one I've read has yet said (but somebody must be saying it out there) is that it's ALSO a rewrite of the episode "Naked Time," where Spock first admits that he's never really had friends and that he is ashamed to have them and that Jim is his friend. That was really this movie. Cause it's only 6 months in for them in STID, similar to Naked Time, rather than like, what, 20 years, as in TWOK. so instead of being so sad they couldn't touch and be together and have more, cause they were middle-aged, they're sad they'll never have anything at all, and Spock is finally able to admit, in that moment, that they're friends -- in a way that he admitted it to Kirk in that conference room on the Enterprise in Naked Time -- "Jim, when I feel friendship for you, I'm ashamed." That's THIS movie. STID.
So basically I read a lot of meta-critiques on lj, dreamwidth, tumblr, and trekmovie.com, and I even saw Bob Orci write back to some of them there... and some of them were right. But in the end, I think the JJ team did pretty damn well -- or mostly well. I could've done without some of the excess JJ Abrams 'let's move them along too fast to breathe or speak or think oooo xplosions instead!!!" stuff... but basically, they were all there anyway, despite or because of it.
I mean, all the original TOS movies are both wonderful (in their subtle characterizations) and heinous (in other thoughtless ways). how was STID any different?
So bring on the fic, I say. Bring on the fix-its that start from a place of love. Bring on the next movie in 2016 for the 50th anniversary (and if they get that one right too, I will say that they indeed deserved praise all along-- as i think these first two installments are quite great in their different ways. if, however, they double down on the bad parts of STID -- like the lack of female characters other than Uhura who do anything interesting or important, or not putting in diverse characters, like another whitewashed character or no queer people of any stripe (ie failing to push our 21st century boundaries as Gene succeeded in genuinely pushing the late 20th century's boundaries...), or make it even more about explosions and less about heart, or they marry off both Kirk and Spock, somehow burying the secret original slash OTP in the sand COMPLETELY...then I'll say they went wrong.
But I don't think they will. I'm putting my money down on it, and sure, I'm gonna be sad and pissed if I'm wrong about that... But right now, I'm in a place where I would argue that it's all a major gift, that we Trek fans live in the time that we do, where they're making new beautiful movies about our favorite people with good casts, good special effects, and some decent and interesting ideas.
"These are the days of miracle and wonder" for Star Trek fans, and I wish fandom would get that. I think part of the problem is that the gap between 2009 and STID was like that too-long period that happened between Goblet of Fire and Order of the Phoenix. I think we had one too many years to get used to the universe as it was after 2009 (see: people never getting over that Draco didn't turn out sexy, but he didn't, and I know, that's also sad for me, but I accepted it! There is of course something to bed said here for how far does canon have to disappoint before you check out completely... I'm looking at you George fucking Lucas, but we're nowhere near there yet!)... Maybe if the movie had come out in 2012, right as fandom had almost simmered down completely, we would've taken it better? OR maybe wey're just going to take a while to get back on board? Maybe this happened with every Star Trek movie in the 80s, and I'm just too young to remember it? Are there always recriminations after each new installment?
And if so, are the vehemence of the recriminations perhaps in inverse proportion to how much people are invested? i.e. ACTUALLY everyone is obsessed with the Rebootverse more than they have been with anything since our beloved crew's last bow-out in Undiscovered Country???
So I hope, I hope it will ignite some people, which is why I'm glad to've found a few who are ignited...
For instance, people I semi-worship in the ST-verse, like Killashandra, ie killabeez on lj, who is one of the old K/S-ers whom I love (and especially love her headcanon about TOS in fics like Bitter Glass), among others, basically hated it in her lj meta/review... and I just can't get behind that. And it makes me so sad because now I can't ask her: dude, we all thought Spock Prime's bow-out/wonderful end was to go off to the Nexus to join Jim in the sunset after making peace on Romulus (a la your wonderful fic) but he didn't. Romulus didn't work, and he went back in time instead and saw his life happen differently all over again with a new Jim and Spock. What do you make of that?!
It's a different interpretation, a different world, but I still recognize them! I just do.
I'll end with this. The second time I went to see STID (which I liked even better than the first, in fact -- some of the haters should make sure they see it twice, for real), I took my dad, who has loved TOS since 1973-74 and was the original one to get me into it all when I was a child and in high school... and as the credits rolled, as their zooming off on their rebooted 5-year voyage, I turned to him and was like, "So?" and he turned to me, the biggest lover and critic I know, and took a breath and a second to come out of his headspace about it, and then this big smile came over his face and he said, "It was really good."
At this time in my life, I'm seriously so out of internet/lj fandom that I don't even know how to work the doohickeys for posting links anymore (bear with me!), so the fact that I'm even posting this at all, well, you must know it's damn fucking SPECIAL-- These Shades of Love,derryere
I've been in fandom for 9 years now, and I've never read anything *ever* (with the exception of Killashandra's "Bitter Glass" for Kirk/Spock) that so well and beautifully answered such a truly painful fandom 'loose end' as this does for Doctor Who, specifically for the Tenth Doctor/Rose Tyler relationship. Period. So if any or all of that that strikes you as your cup of tea, GO NOW.
By the way, this fic picks up right where the episode, Journey's End, leaves off, so if you, like me, loved it SO MUCH originally but haven't watched it in a while, for refreshment, here's the last 4 minutes of that episode. It really does take off from right where this clip ends, so you will likely be a bit emotionally/spatially befuddled if you don't refresh yourself first...
David Tennant's Doctor and Rose. The greatest love story never told. The end.
