Star Trek Into Darkness Review (Spoilers)

Star Trek Into Darkness Review

The long wait is over. The long speculated and often over analyzed about a certain character has finally been resolved and now Star Trek Into Darkness has graced the screens in North American cinemas.  This has been a movie I have been anxiously been waiting to see ever since Into Darkness started filming and the supporting cast was announced.  So now the day has come and I have seen one of the eagerly anticipated movies of 2013 full of excitement and intrigued as to what I was about to see.  So read on if you want to know my opinion on the latest installment to the J.J Abrams Star Trek series and of course do not read the review if you haven’t seen the movie yet as there will be spoilers.  Unless of course you don’t care about that but if you do go now and run away.

Well what a movie Star Trek Into Darkness is.  Right from the get go it was action, action and more action.  But it was more than that as we are given a story about how Kirk must be responsible for his actions and take responsibility and to follow the orders he is given instead of bucking the system all the time.   The story expands from there as we see Kirk later on starting to listen to his officers and more importantly the advice of Spock as Kirk starts listening to his gut instead of the bravado that got him in trouble earlier in the movie when he broke the Prime Directive to save Spocks life.  In a way we see Kirk mature into the Captain we all know and the bond between Kirk and Spock finally takes shape to the great friendship we are accustomed to seeing.

Into Darkness also features on what would you do for your family.  In the case of Kirk what lengths he would go to save his crew and his ship from disaster.   We find out he would go to severe lengths to save everyone including sacrificing himself.  The same can be said for John Harrison or in this case as he is called and this comes as no big surprise Khan.  It appears the two adversaries would do anything for their family which is their crew and go to extraordinary lengths to protect them.  In a way Khan and Kirk have more in common than we are lead to believe even if they stand on either side of the spectrum.

Benedict Cumberbatch gives us a different take on the character of Khan.  Here we have a cool and calculating villain that is far different than the version we have seen in The Space Seed or Wrath of Khan.  He has a calmness to him and Khan doesn’t let things bother him.  A much colder version that is just as ruthless and cunning as the original.  What I liked about him is how arrogant he is and how he is able to manipulate Kirk to get what he wants.  Benedict Cumberbatch is really good as Khan and the way he delivers his lines just send shivers down your spine as he sounds really evil when he says them and when you realize he is Khan it makes the dialog that more memorable. 

I really liked the different storylines going on in Into Darkness as there is a lot of twists.  Why was Khan causing terror against the Federation and why was Admiral Markus so hell bent on going to war against the Klingons.  What was good was that Kirk and Khan ended up being pawns in Admiral Markus’s grand scheme of things and it was interesting to see the moral dilemma that Kirk was embroiled in.   Like going against Star Fleet itself and having to ask Khan for help against Admiral Markus.   Everything was linked very well and the conclusion was pretty interesting to say the least even if it was a tad predictable but hey Star Trek has always been like that and maybe not everyone will figure out how things happen ahead of time.

What I though was pretty interesting was reversal of The Wrath of Khan as Kirk and Spock roles were reversed and it was interesting to see how the other would react in those situations.  I did like how they incorporated the two Khan stories into Star Trek Into Darkness while not cheeping the new version or tainting the original.  It was a great nod to the diehard fans and the new fans will love it just the same.  The only thing that I thought was corny was having Spock yelling Khan like Shatner did in Wrath of Khan.  It just did not seem believable and I thought it sounded funny.

Star Trek Into Darkness was a really great film that I enjoyed very much.  One of the main indicators for me is how many times I check my watch during the film.  Star Trek Into Darkness did not make me check my watch at all as I was that engrossed into the story and wanted to see what would happen next.  It was that good and extremely interesting and entertaining that if you did look at your watch you would risk missing something.  Star Trek Into Darkness gets the 2013 movie season going on the right track and will go down as one of the best movies of this year and certainly be one of the best Star Trek movies of all time. 

Grade A+