Someone's head got smashed? I don't remember that.
It was Robocop who got his head crushed. They didn't show it on screen, but they showed Carol's reaction scream. It was pretty cool. DAT CRUNCH!
Just got out of the theater. I don't know, I didn't like it as much as the first. Mostly, I think, because of the reenactment of the Kirk-Spock death scene. It just made a gimmick out of a scene that defined Star Trek.
Thing is also, I really like Cumberbatch as an actor. But he's not Khan. The original Khan was oozing a superiority complex and that was exactly what became his downfall. This new Khan just seemed mindlessly violent.
And, too much action. The plot was scattered between minute-long scenes of CGI and fist fights.
Mostly this.
I didn't buy a pasty white British guy as Khan Noonien Sigh for a second. He made a very good villain, but he did not make a good Khan. Unfortunately it's hard to ignore it when the entire plot hinges on the fact he's Khan. I love how the big reveal had absolutely no impact, since Kirk obviously has no clue who he is.
Overall an enjoyable movie, if you know absolutely nothing about Star Trek or science, as neither the writers or JJ did. Despite a lot of improvement in certain areas, it was another big mindless action movie. And don't get me wrong, it was an excellent mindless action movie! But still flawed in many of the same ways as the first.
They did greatly improve the characters overall, and utilize them a lot better than the first one. Having Scotty head straight to the bar was fun, and having him leave because of his professional pride in maintaining the ship and the safety of the crew was believable, especially after it was justified.
Spock's quote of "the needs of the many etc" was kind of shoehorned in though. He wasn't saving anyone by sacrificing himself. He was just avoiding contaminating a culture. Why all the BS about upholding the Prime Directive, when the very reason he was going to die was because he'd already violated the Prime Directive? wtf? And hiding the Enterprise under water? Really?
"Dear Lord, that's over 150 atmospheres of pressure!"
"How many atmopsheres can the ship withstand?"
"Well, it's a spaceship, so I'd say anywhere between 0 and 1."
Kirk was definitely improved, especially with a lot more attempted dynamic with Spock and Bones. You could see they tried to play their development off each other to establish that. It didn't always work, but it was a lot better than in the first movie.
The Klingon ships looked badass, as did their costumes, but they ruined their look just as badly as they messed up the Romulans in the last one. In fact, they basically just made them look like the Romulans. Does JJ have to make every single bad guy alien look like a bald goblin with piercings and pointed ears? I would have kept the helmet on too.
The references were a mixed back. It was neat seeing the Enterprise ring ship from TMP (and it looked exactly like the more recent model from the SOTL calendar), and the NX-01, and the reference to Section 31 was ok (even though I hated the entire section 31 storyline even in DS9). The tribble was very forced in there though, as even if they did know about tribbles at this point, they would have learned better than to have even one on board. At least they didn't change them. It was a furry ball that had the same sound effect.
The rehashed TWOK scenes were a bit of a facepalm. It's not that they did them badly, but it was a mere shadow of TWOK, a movie where these characters had developed a strong friendship over so long. They did use it as a good turning point in the developing friendship between new Kirk and new Spock though.
Which brings me back to the awful science of the movie. So Kirk had to climb into this giant spherical generic scifi room to "realign" the thingy that was out of whack by kicking it repeatedly. I love the precision engineering of this ship, and the ease of access. How did this thingy even get misaligned? If it's something that radioactive and dangerous, you'd hope it's a bit more well constructed than "oops, it fell out" and "eh that's about the right spot".
And I'd love to know how the writers think artificial gravity works, I really would. The ship didn't seem to be close enough for the screwed gravity to be from the planet. The ship was hurtling too randomly for me to believe it was due to the acceleration of the ship. It was just "whatever the hell direction we need it to be in".
And that new ship was ridiculous. I'm not even going to touch the Iron Man scene with the shooting right into the port as it's de-pressurizing and throwing a guy out.
And what is with JJ's love for blowing shit up? It kind of lessens the impact when every single scene is destroying the Enterprise, or destroying all of Starfleet, or killing off every single Captain, etc. It just keeps going.
And at what point did they upgrade the Enterprise's warp engines to shit glitter? Twinkle twinkle little starship, how I wonder what they were thinking......
Khan's magical healing blood that revives people from the dead, and cures cancer and radiation and herpes........ riiiiiiiight...........
Anyway, more to say, but that's all I has time for now. Overall I
did enjoy the movie, more than it seems from me focusing on the bad here, but it lacked the intelligence and optimism that I like to see in Star Trek. For a Hollywood blockbuster movie though, it's a movie I'd definitely watch again (not at the movies though). The CG was incredible, and some of the most seamless I've seen. And overall I'd say the movie was a bit better than the last, and I've watched that movie several times.