Review: Star Trek: Into Darkness

While not quite up the level of the last Star Trek, this installment had plenty of great effects to satisfy a summer movie craving. (aceshowbiz.com/Paramount Pictures)

The last movie review on this here site was all the way back on January 20th for Zero Dark Thirty. Fast forward to late May, 2013, and here we are with my first new review in almost half a year, and my first trip to the theaters in far too long! Not only is it good to get back to writing for this blog, but it’s good to finally get back to seeing movies on the silver screen again. Let’s see how Star Trek: Into Darkness played out for me…

My expectations were mildly high coming into this movie, simply because the first Star Trek from J.J. Abrams that came out a few years ago was just so good. Same cast, exciting looking trailers, good-looking special effects – this has to be tremendous, right? I mean, if Rotten Tomatoes says it’s nearly 90% fresh, who am I to argue? Well, as it turns out, being an unqualified reviewer, I can argue just about anything I want. And while Into Darkness was fun, and had great special effects, it was just…good. Nothing great, nothing special, and unfortunately something I’ll most likely forget quite soon.

Maybe I wasn’t paying close enough attention, but I didn’t seem to notice the humor and back-and-forth between characters as much as the previous installment. What made that first movie so special was the ability to mesh incredible alien atmospheres and pulse pounding action, with plenty of laughs to make it feel human, to make you care about the characters. Now don’t get me wrong, this wasn’t as somber as a World War II movie, but I would have liked to see a little more “fun” being had.

It may sound like I just trashed the movie a little bit, and that really is not my intention. Into Darkness had plenty of the same aspects that the first entry in the series did – incredible effects, ridiculous action sequences…just visual magic. Nothing changed in that department for sure. It had a plot that kept you interested, even if you’re not on the edge of your seat (I wasn’t), and did a solid job of being a fun summer blockbuster/popcorn flick.

I don’t know if there’s a third movie in the works for this franchise (Abrams might be a little busy with Star Wars now), but if there is, I’d tailor my expectations more to what this film turned out to be. And there’s really nothing wrong with that.

STAR TREK: INTO DARKNESS:   (out of 4)